Meeting Abstract

52.1  Tuesday, Jan. 5  A DNA barcoding approach to identifying newly transformed juvenile freshwater mussels (Bivalvia: Unionidae) recovered from naturally infested fishes BOYER, S.L.*; HOWE, A.A.; HOVE, M.C.; Macalester College; Macalester College; Macalester College; University of Minnesota boyer@macalester.edu

We have developed a multilocus DNA barcoding approach to identification of newly transformed juvenile unionid mussels collected from naturally infested fishes from a federally protected waterway that is home to a highly diverse mussel community. We built reference databases from identified adult mussels using both new data from freshly collected specimens and publicly available data downloaded from GenBank. We assessed the efficacy of the mitochondrial loci COI and ND1 for DNA barcoding and concluded that both loci perform well for species identification in phylogenetic analyses, with the majority of species forming monospecific clades with high bootstrap and posterior probability support. Exceptions to this rule involve previously published sequences and likely represent errors in labeling of samples, demonstrating the value of voucher specimens and highlighting the importance of caution when working with publicly available data. To obtain newly-transformed juvenile mussels, we collected three fish species that were naturally infested with unionid glochidia and held them in aquaria until the mussels emerged. When sequences from these juveniles were included in phylogenetic analyses, they grouped with single species (or in one case a pair of closely related species) with high support. In many cases, it is impossible to identify juveniles using morphology alone, so this approach will be of great utility to researchers and interested in the relationship between unionid mussels and their fish hosts.