Molecular Phylogeny and Biogeography of the Amphidromous Fish Genus Dormitator Gill 1861 (Teleostei: Eleotridae)

Species of the genus Dormitator, also known as sleepers, are representatives of the amphidromous freshwater fish fauna that inhabit the tropical and subtropical coastal environments of the Americas and Western Africa. Because of the distribution of this genus, it could be hypothesized that the evolutionary patterns in this genus, including a pair of geminate species across the Central American Isthmus, could be explained by vicariance following the break-up of Gondwana. However, the evolutionary history of this group has not been evaluated. We constructed a time-scaled molecular phylogeny of Dormitator using mitochondrial (Cytochrome b) and nuclear (Rhodopsin and β-actin) DNA sequence data to infer and date the cladogenetic events that drove the diversification of the genus and to relate them to the biogeographical history of Central America. Two divergent lineages of Dormitator were recovered: one that included all of the Pacific samples and another that included all of the eastern and western Atlantic samples. In contrast to the Pacific lineage, which showed no phylogeographic structure, the Atlantic lineage was geographically structured into four clades: Cameroon, Gulf of Mexico, West Cuba and Caribbean, showing evidence of potential cryptic species. The separation of the Pacific and Atlantic lineages was estimated to have occurred ~1 million years ago (Mya), whereas the four Atlantic clades showed mean times of divergence between 0.2 and 0.4 Mya. The splitting times of Dormitator between ocean basins are similar to those estimated for other geminate species pairs with shoreline estuarine preferences, which may indicate that the common evolutionary histories of the different clades are the result of isolation events associated with the closure of the Central American Isthmus and the subsequent climatic and oceanographic changes.