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Type: Article
Published: 2019-10-02
Page range: 149–168
Abstract views: 25
PDF downloaded: 1

Lithophyllum longense (Corallinales, Rhodophyta): a species with a widespread Indian Ocean distribution

Department of Biodiversity & Conservation Biology, University of the Western Cape, P. Bag X17, Bellville 7535, South Africa.
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Department of Biodiversity Conservation and Attractions-Parks and Wildlife Service
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R.A. TOWNSEND

The Western Australian Herbarium
Tanzania Fisheries Research Institute
biogeography coralline algae cryptic diversity DNA sequencing morpho-anatomy Algae

Abstract

Lithophyllum longense is characterized from Long Reef, Western Australia, Australia and from Chwaka Bay, Zanzibar Island, Tanzania.  Both plastid markers psbA and rbcL confirm that L. longense is a distinct species despite its being morpho-anatomically nearly indistinguishable from several other fruticose Lithophyllum species, differing in only one (from L. atlanticum, L. platyphyllum, L. sublicatum, L. yemenense) or two (from L. affine, L. incrustans, L. kotschyanum, L. neocongestum, L. kaiseri, L. pseudoplatyphyllum, L. subreduncum) character states.  This is only the second tropical Lithophyllum species and the fourth tropical species confirmed by DNA sequencing to be widely distributed in the Indo-West Pacific.