TY - JOUR AB - Advanced stages of Scyllarus phyllosoma larvae were collected by demersal trawling during fishery research surveys in the western Mediterranean Sea in 2003–2005. Nucleotide sequence analysis of the mitochondrial 16S rDNA gene allowed the final-stage phyllosoma of Scyllarus arctus to be identified among these larvae. Its morphology is described and illustrated. This constitutes the second complete description of a Scyllaridae phyllosoma with its specific identity being validated by molecular techniques (the first was S. pygmaeus). These results also solved a long lasting taxonomic anomaly of several species assigned to the ancient genus Phyllosoma Leach, 1814. Detailed examination indicated that the final-stage phyllosoma of S. arctus shows closer affinities with the American scyllarid Scyllarus depressus or with the Australian Scyllarus sp. b (sensu Phillips et al., 1981) than to its sympatric species S. pygmaeus. AU - Palero, Ferran AU - Guerao, Guillermo AU - Clark, Paul AU - Abello, Pere ID - 3784 IS - 2 JF - Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom TI - Scyllarus arctus (Crustacea: Decapoda: Scyllaridae) final stage phyllosoma identified by DNA analysis, with morphological description VL - 91 ER - TY - JOUR AB - Defining population structure and genetic diversity levels is of the utmost importance for developing efficient conservation strategies. Overfishing has caused mean annual catches of the European spiny lobster (Palinurus elephas) to decrease alarmingly along its distribution area. In this context, there is a need for comprehensive studies aiming to evaluate the genetic health of the exploited populations. The present study is based on a set of ten nuclear markers amplified in 331 individuals from ten different localities covering most of P. elephas distribution area. Samples from Atlantic and Mediterranean basins showed small but significant differences, indicating that P. elephas populations do not behave as a single panmictic unit but form two partially-overlapping groups. Despite intense overfishing, our dataset did not recover a recent bottleneck signal, and instead showed a large and stable historical effective size. This result could be accounted for by specific life-history traits (reproduction and longevity) and the limitations of molecular markers in covering recent timescales for nontemporal samples. The findings of the present study emphasize the need to integrate information on effective population sizes and life-history parameters when evaluating population connectivity levels from genetic data. AU - Palero, Ferran AU - Abello, Pere AU - Macpherson, Enrique AU - Beaumont, Mark AU - Pascual, Marta ID - 3395 IS - 2 JF - Biological Journal of the Linnean Society TI - Effect of oceanographic barriers and overfishing on the population genetic structure of the European spiny lobster Palinurus elephas VL - 104 ER - TY - GEN AB - Defining population structure and genetic diversity levels is of the utmost importance for developing efficient conservation strategies. Overfishing has caused mean annual catches of the European spiny lobster (Palinurus elephas) to decrease alarmingly along its distribution area. In this context, there is a need for comprehensive studies to evaluate the genetic health of the exploited populations. The present work is based on a set of 10 nuclear markers amplified in 331 individuals from 10 different localities covering most of P. elephas distribution area. Samples from Atlantic and Mediterranean basins showed small but significant differences, indicating that P. elephas populations do not behave as a single panmictic unit but form two partially-overlapping groups. Despite intense overfishing, our dataset did not recover a recent bottleneck signal, and showed a large and stable historical effective size instead. This result could be accounted for by specific life history traits (reproduction and longevity) and the limitations of molecular markers in covering very recent timescales for non temporal samples. Our study emphasizes the necessity of integrating information on effective population sizes and life history parameters when evaluating population connectivity levels from genetic data. AU - Palero, Ferran AU - Abello, Pere AU - Macpherson, Enrique AU - Beaumont, Mark AU - Pascual, Marta ID - 9762 TI - Data from: Effect of oceanographic barriers and overfishing on the population genetic structure of the European spiny lobster (Palinurus elephas) ER - TY - JOUR AB - MICROSATELIGHT is a Perl/Tk pipeline with a graphical user interface that facilitates several tasks when scoring microsatellites. It implements new subroutines in R and PERL and takes advantage of features provided by previously developed freeware. MICROSATELIGHT takes raw genotype data and automates the peak identification through PeakScanner. The PeakSelect subroutine assigns peaks to different microsatellite markers according to their multiplex group, fluorochrome type, and size range. After peak selection, binning of alleles can be carried out 1) automatically through AlleloBin or 2) by manual bin definition through Binator. In both cases, several features for quality checking and further binning improvement are provided. The genotype table can then be converted into input files for several population genetics programs through CREATE. Finally, Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium tests and confidence intervals for null allele frequency can be obtained through GENEPOP. MICROSATELIGHT is the only freely available public-domain software that facilitates full multiplex microsatellite scoring, from electropherogram files to user-defined text files to be used with population genetics software. MICROSATELIGHT has been created for the Windows XP operating system and has been successfully tested under Windows 7. It is available at http://sourceforge.net/projects/microsatelight/. AU - Palero, Ferran AU - González Candelas, Fernando AU - Pascual, Marta ID - 3783 IS - 2 JF - Journal of Heredity TI - Microsatelight – Pipeline to expedite microsatellite analysis VL - 102 ER - TY - JOUR AB - DNA samples were extracted from ethanol and formalin-fixed decapod crustacean tissue using a new method based on Tetramethylsilane (TMS)-Chelex. It is shown that neither an indigestible matrix of cross-linked protein nor soluble PCR inhibitors impede PCR success when dealing with formalin-fixed material. Instead, amplification success from formalin-fixed tissue appears to depend on the presence of unmodified DNA in the extracted sample. A staining method that facilitates the targeting of samples with a high content of unmodified DNA is provided. AU - Palero, Ferran AU - Hall, Sally AU - Clark, Paul AU - Johnston, David AU - Mackenzie Dodds, Jackie AU - Thatje, Sven ID - 3787 IS - 3 JF - Scientia Marina TI - DNA extraction from formalin-fixed tissue: new light from the deep sea VL - 74 ER - TY - JOUR AB - Four rare palinurid phyllosoma larvae, one mid-stage and three final stage, were found among the unclassified collections in the Crustacea Section, Natural History Museum, London. Detailed morphological analysis of the larvae indicated that they belong to several Palinustus species given the presence of incipient blunt-horns, length of antennula, length ratio of segments of antennular peduncle, distribution of pereiopod spines, and shape of uropods and telson. Moreover, the size of the final-stage larvae agrees with that expected given the size of the recently described puerulus stage of Palinustus mossambicus. This constitutes the first description of a complete phyllosoma assigned to Palinustus species. The phyllosoma described in the present study include the largest Palinuridae larva ever found. AU - Palero, Ferran AU - Guerao, Guillermo AU - Clark, Paul AU - Abello, Pere ID - 3786 IS - 1 JF - Zootaxa TI - Final-stage phyllosoma of Palinustus A. Milne-Edwards, 1880 (Crustacea: Decapoda: Achelata: Palinuridae)-The first complete description VL - 2403 ER - TY - JOUR AB - Most fisheries involving spiny lobsters of the genus Palinurus have been over exploited during the last decades, so there is a raising concern about management decisions for these valuable resources. A total of 13 microsatellite DNA loci recently developed in Palinurus elephas were assayed in order to assess genetic diversity levels in every known species of the genus. Microsatellite markers gave amplifications and showed polymorphism in all species, with gene diversity values varying from 0.65060.077 SD (Palinurus barbarae) to 0.79260.051 SD (Palinurus elephas). Most importantly, when depth distribution was taken into account, shallower waters pecies consistently showed larger historical effective population sizes than their deeper-water counterparts. This could explain why deeper-water species are more sensitive to overfishing, and would indicate that overexploitation may have a larger impact on their long-term genetic diversity. AU - Palero, Ferran AU - Abello, Pere AU - Macpherson, E. AU - Matthee, C. AU - Pascual, Marta ID - 3785 IS - 4 JF - Journal of Crustacean Biology SN - 0278-0372 TI - Genetic diversity levels in fishery-exploited spiny lobsters of the Genus Palinurus (Decapoda: Achelata) VL - 30 ER -