Demographic and genetic structure of the scallop Flexopecten glaber from the lagoon of Bizerte (Tunisia)
Keywords:
Breeding, Exploitation, Endemic species, DNA, Divergence, Aquaculture, Lagoons, Genetic variation, Phylogeny, Marine, Flexopecten glaber, MED, Tunisia, Bizerte, Bizerte lagoonAbstract
The smooth scallop Flexopecten glaber (Linnaeus, 1758) is an endemic species of the Mediterranean. It has a regional commercial importance (Greece and Turkey). In Tunisia, it is particularly frequent in the lagoon of Bizerte. It is a good candidate species for aquaculture. There are no available data on the genetic diversity of the Tunisian populations of this scallop. For a possible exploitation by breeding, a genetic characterization is necessary in order to determine the state of the genetic resources which are extremely useful for a rational management of this species. For these reasons, we conducted a genetic study based on the sequencing of the 16S mitochondrial DNA of F. glaber. The Neighbor-Joining phylogenetic tree revealed a weak gene flow and a remarkable genetic divergence between the Tunisian, Italian and Greek populations. Data simulated according to the population expansion model of the F. glaber population in the Bizerte lagoon revealed a sudden recent expansion.
