Skip to main content
Log in

Similarity of Karyotype Structure in Three Mormyrus Species (Mormyridae) from the White Nile and Omo River Tributaries (Ethiopia)

  • SHORT COMMUNICATION
  • Published:
Journal of Ichthyology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

We studied the mitotic chromosome sets in three elephantfish species of the genus Mormyrus (Mormyridae, Osteoglossiformes) occurring in the White Nile and Omo-Turkana basins in south-western Ethiopia. The karyotype structure (2n = 50, FN = 84) appeared to be similar in M. caschive, M. hasselquistii and M. kannume. The Mormyrus is 14th mormyrid genera studied cytogenetically and its karyotype is unique within the family because of the least number of uni-armed chromosomes.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Fig. 1.

Similar content being viewed by others

REFERENCES

  1. Alves-Gomes, J. and Hopkins, C.D., Molecular insights into the phylogeny of mormyriform fishes and the evolution of their electric organs, Brain Behav. Evol., 1997, vol. 49, pp. 324–350. https://doi.org/10.1159/000113001

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Arai, R., Fish Karyotypes: A Check List, New York: Springer-Verlag, 2011. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-53877-6

  3. Canitz, J., Kirschbaum, F., and Tiedemann, R., Karyotype description of the African weakly electric fish Campylomormyrus compressirostris in the context of chromosome evolution in Osteoglossiformes, J. Physiol. (Paris), 2016, vol. 110, pp. 273–280. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jphysparis.2017.01.002

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Carlson, B.A. and Arnegard, M.E., Neural innovations and the diversification of African weakly electric fishes, Comm. Integr. Biol., 2011, vol. 4, pp. 720–725. https://doi.org/10.4161/cib.17483

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Catalog of Fishes: Genera, Species, References, Version 06/2020, Eschmeyer, W.N., Fricke, R., and van der Laan, R., Eds., 2020. http://researcharchive.calacademy.org/research/ichthyology/catalog/fishcatmain.asp.

  6. de Oliveira, E.A., Bertollo, L.A.C., Rab, P., Ezaz, T., Yano, C.F., Hatanaka, T., Jegede, O.I., Tanomtong, A., Liehr, T., Sember, A., Maruyama, S.R., Feldberg, E., Viana P.F., and de Bello Cioffi, M., Cytogenetics, genomics and biodiversity of the South American and African Arapaimidae fish family (Teleostei, Osteoglossiformes), PLoS One, 2019, vol. 14, no. 3, art. ID e0214225. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0214225

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  7. FishBase, Version 07/2020 Froese, R. and Pauly, D., Eds., 2020, http://www.fishbase.org.

  8. Golubtsov, A.S., Darkov, A.A., Dgebuadze, Y.Y., and Mina M.V., An Artificial Key to Fish Species of the Gambela Region (the White Nile Basin in the Limits of Ethiopia), Addis Ababa: Joint Ethio-Russ. Biol. Exp., 1995.

  9. Hopkins, C.D., Electrical perception and communication, in Encyclopedia of Neuroscience, Squire, L.R., Ed., Oxford: Academic, 2009, vol. 3, pp. 813–831. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-008045046-9.01827-1

  10. Johnson, T.C. and Malala, J.O., Lake Turkana and its link to the Nile, in The Nile: Origin, Environments, Limnology and Human Use, Dumont, H.J., Ed., Dordrecht: Springer-Verlag, 2009, vol. 89, pp. 287–304.

    Google Scholar 

  11. Kligerman, A.D. and Bloom, S.E., Rapid chromosome preparations from solid tissues of fishes, J. Fish. Res. Board Can., 1977, vol. 34, pp. 266–269. https://doi.org/10.1139/f77-039

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Krysanov, E.Yu. and Golubtsov, A.S., Karyotypes of four fish species from the Nile and Omo-Turkana basins in Ethiopia, J. Ichthyol., 2014, vol. 54, pp. 889–892. https://doi.org/10.1134/S0032945214100087

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Lavoué, S., Sullivan, J.P., and Hopkins, C.D., Phylogenetic utility of the first two introns of the S7 ribosomal protein gene in African electric fishes (Mormyroidea: Teleostei) and congruence with other molecular markers, Biol. J. Linn. Soc., 2003, vol. 78, pp. 273–292. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1095-8312.2003.00170.x

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Levan, A., Fredga, K., and Sandberg, A., Nomenclature for centromeric position on chromosomes, Hereditas, 1964, vol. 52, pp. 201–220. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1601-5223.1964.tb01953.x

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Lévêque, C., Paugy, D., and Teugels, G.G., Annotated check-list of the freshwater fishes of the Nilo-Sudan river basins, in Africa, Rev. Hydrobiol. Trop., 1991, vol. 24, pp. 131–154.

    Google Scholar 

  16. Nakatani, Y., Takeda, H., Kohara, Y., and Morishita, S., Reconstruction of the vertebrate ancestral genome reveals dynamic genome reorganization in early vertebrates, Genome Res., 2007, vol. 17, pp. 1254–1265. https://doi.org/10.1101/gr.6316407.7

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  17. Neumann, D., Obermaier, H., and Moritz, T., Annotated checklist for fishes of the Main Nile Basin in the Sudan and Egypt based on recent specimen records (2006–2015), Cybium, 2016, vol. 40, pp. 287–317. https://doi.org/10.26028/cybium/2016-404-004

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Ozouf-Costaz, C., Coutanceau, J.-P., Bonillo, C., Belkadi, L., Fermon, Y., Agnèse, J.-F., Guidi-Rontani, C., and Paugy, D., First insights into karyotype evolution within the family Mormyridae, Cybium, 2015, vol. 39, pp. 227–236. https://doi.org/10.26028/cybium/2015-393-006

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Sacerdot, C., Louis, A., Bon, C., Berthelot, C., and Crollius, H.R., Chromosome evolution at the origin of the ancestral vertebrate genome, Genome Biol., 2018, vol. 19, p. 166. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13059-018-1559-1

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  20. Simanovsky, S., Medvedev, D., Tefera, F., and Golubtsov, A., First cytogenetic information for five Nilotic elephantfishes and a problem of ancestral karyotype of the family Mormyridae (Osteoglossiformes), Comp. Cytogenet., 2020, vol. 14, no. 3, pp. 387−397. https://doi.org/10.3897/CompCytogen.14i3.52727

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  21. Sullivan, J.P., Lavoué, S., and Hopkins, C.D., Molecular systematics of the African electric fishes (Mormyroidea: Teleostei) and a model for the evolution of their electric organs, J. Exp. Biol., 2000, vol. 203, pp. 665–683.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  22. Uyeno, T., A comparative study of chromosomes in the teleostean fish order Osteoglossiformes, Jpn. J. Ichthyol., 1973, vol. 20, pp. 211–217.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We gratefully acknowledge the JERBE coordinator A.A. Darkov (Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution RAS, Moscow) for logistic support, S.E. Cherenkov (Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution RAS, Moscow) for sharing field operations and assistance in collecting material, E.Yu. Krysanov (Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution RAS, Moscow) for precious help at different stages of our work, M.V. Mina (Koltsov Institute of Developmental Biology RAS, Moscow) for critical comments on the manuscript.

Funding

This work is financially supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research, project no. 18-34-00638 for SS and benefits also (at the stage of manuscript preparation) from the Russian Science Foundation, project no. 19-14-00218 for AG.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to S. A. Simanovsky.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interests. The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Statement on the welfare of animals. All applicable international, national, and/or institutional guidelines for the care and use of animals were followed.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Simanovsky, S.A., Medvedev, D.A., Tefera, F. et al. Similarity of Karyotype Structure in Three Mormyrus Species (Mormyridae) from the White Nile and Omo River Tributaries (Ethiopia). J. Ichthyol. 61, 323–326 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1134/S003294522102017X

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1134/S003294522102017X

Keywords:

Navigation