Molecular Phylogeny of Cyprinid Fishes of India Using 12s rRNA Gene Sequences

Taxonomic position of the four important coldwater fish species of India - namely, the snow trout, Schizothorax richardsonii (Gray); golden mahseer, Tor putitora (Hamilton-Buchanan); Indian trout, Raiamus bola (Hamilton-Buchanan) and garra, Garra gotyla (Gray) - varies according to different sources. In order to confirm the subfamily level taxonomic positions, a pair of universal primers amplified 12S rRNA genes of these species. The universal primers uniformly amplified 456 bp lengths of 12S rRNA genes of all the species. The amplified genes were sequenced further, and the base composition and the alignment of sequences were compared. The presence of a common conserved core region of all the four fish 12S rRNA genes indicates that all these species belong to the same family (Cyprinidae). The phylogenetic tree constructed based on these 12S rRNA gene sequences suggests the possible occurrence of three subfamilies, namely, Schizothoracinae, Cyprininae and Rasborinae, within the family Cyprinidae