Abstract
The present study was designed for evaluating the efficiency of the Sox2 gene sequences in exploring the evolutionary variations among some Actinopterygii fishes (Cichlidae, Mugilidae, Poeciliidae and Pomacentridae) compared with Sox14 and COI sequences. DNA polymorphisms among and within the evaluated fishes were calculated. Both mitochondrial (COI) and nuclear (Sox2 and Sox14) DNA markers reliably separated the estimated fish species. The lowest distance values were calculated between Mugilidae and Cichlidae fishes.
The genetic distance values between Pomacentridae and Mugilidae were lower than the distance values between Pomcentridae and both Poeciliidae and Cichlidae. Also, the results showed that Poeciliidae is distantly related to the other evaluated fish families. The revealed results have considerable value for future Actinopterygii conservation applications and scenarios. The analysis of the three gene fragments (Sox2, Sox14 and COI) sequences could be informative for reconstructing the true evolutionary variations in these widely distributed fishes. More informative DNA markers should be developed to improve knowledge on Actinopterygii evolutionary variations and diversification. We recommend increasing more efforts focused on Actinopterygii molecular identification as a main step that could improve fish conservation.