Meeting Abstract

120.2  Monday, Jan. 7  New species, same damn color: Benefits of using molecular data to identify diversity in a poorly studied group of sea slugs KNUTSON, VL*; GOSLINER, T; San Francisco State University, California; California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco vknutson@gmail.com

Gymnodoris is a genus of sea slugs that contains approximately 35 described species distributed throughout the Indo-West Pacific. The group displays a variety of feeding habits including cannibalism and parasitism, which offers an opportunity to study the evolution of feeding specialization. However, the relationships between species have not been assessed, and much of the diversity remains undescribed. Many of the species descriptions are poor and lack sufficient details, making it difficult to match existing names to specimens. Preliminary sampling indicates that Gymnodoris is a diverse, previously taxonomically neglected group, with tens of undescribed species. Two major difficulties with this group are the similarity of color patterns between different species, and a lack of distinctive external morphological characters. These issues make molecular markers particularly useful for identifying and delineating species. Using molecular markers, we were able to detect the presence of 7 different species of Gymnodoris living at one collection site, when in the field we could only detect 4 morphospecies. In addition, based on the molecular mitochondrial markers 16S, cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) and the nuclear marker histone 3 (H3), we present evidence for cryptic diversity within some well known, widely distributed taxa. Ultimately, a phylogeny of Gymnodoris will bring more attention to this previously neglected genus of nudibranchs and serve to help us understand the evolution of the specialization of feeding in this group.