Phylogeny, genetic diversity and divergence dating of Monodactylus argenteus (Linnaeus, 1758) (Actinopterygii: Monodactylidae) from marine waters of Odisha Coast, Bay of Bengal, India

Among the many different types of aquatic life found in marine ecosystems, fish are the most diverse and commercially important organisms. To support their conservation and management, accurate species identification, genetic, and phylogenetic association studies are crucial. Monodactylus argenteus, the silvery Moony fishes were collected from Gopalpur-on-sea, Odisha Coast of the Bay of Bengal, India and identified as using traditional morpho-taxonomy methods followed by DNA barcoding using cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI) gene. Following identification, the phylogeny, genetic diversity, and divergence time of M. argenteus were investigated. The current study looked at the number of variable sites, parsimony informative sites, nucleotide diversity, and haplotype diversity. The 16 sequenced individuals of M. argenteus produced a total of 13 haplotypes, with 11 unique haplotypes and two shared haplotypes. There were 67 polymorphic sites, including 56 parsimony informative sites and 11 singleton variable sites with 72 mutations. Phylogenetic tree was drawn and all the sequences clustered in agreement with their species level taxonomic classification were observed. The divergence time of the M. argenteus species was estimated to be in the late oligocene sub-epoch, about 25.98 mya, using the RelTime maximum likelihood method. The findings of this study serve as noteworthy confirmation of the utility of DNA barcode sequences for tracking diversity of species and also contribute information on the phylogeny, genetic diversity, and divergence dating of M. argenteus.