Data from: DNA barcoding reveals the coral “laboratory-rat”, Stylophora pistillata encompasses multiple identities
Shashank Keshavmurthy, Sung-Yin Yang, Ada Alamaru, Yao-Yang Chuang, Michel Pichon, David Obura, Silvia Fontana, Stephane De Palmas, Fabrizio Stefani, Francesca Benzoni, Angus MacDonald, Annika M. E. Noreen, Chienshun Chen, Carden C. Wallace, Ruby M. Pillay, Vianney Denis, Affendi Yang Amri, James D. Reimer, Takuma Mezaki, Charles Sheppard, Yossi Loya, Avidor Abelson, Mohammed S. Mohammed, Andrew C. Baker, Pargol G. Mostafavi … & Chaolun A. Chen
Stylophora pistillata is a widely used coral “lab-rat” species with highly variable morphology and a broad biogeographic range (Red Sea to western central Pacific). Here we show, by analysing Cytochorme Oxidase I sequences, from 241 samples across this range, that this taxon in fact comprises four deeply divergent clades corresponding to the Pacific-Western Australia, Chagos-Madagascar-South Africa, Gulf of Aden-Zanzibar- Madagascar, and Red Sea-Persian/Arabian Gulf-Kenya. On the basis of the fossil record of Stylophora, these four...