Priacanthus hamrur (Forsskål, 1775), a marine perch belonging to the family Priacanthidae commonly known as “bulls eye” has started emerging as an important fishery resource in the trawl landings along both the west and east coasts of India. In the present study, genetic stock structure of P. hamrur inhabiting Indian coastal waters was ascertained with mitochondrial DNA sequences from the cytochrome b (cyt-b) gene using samples of the species collected in two samplings from five different geographical locations, viz. Chennai and Visakhapatnam (east coast) and Cochin, Mumbai and Veraval (West coast). Partial sequence of cyt-b gene of P. hamrur from 5 representative regions along the coastal zones was amplified by PCR. The cyt- b marker revealed high haplotype diversity coupled with very low nucleotide diversity within each population, as well as low genetic distance, high gene flow, and high mitochondrial DNA similarity among all five populations. Phylogenetic trees and pairwise analyses demonstrated a very small divergence (0.43-0.64%) between the populations, suggesting the lack of population subdivisions. The overall lack of genetic subdivision among samples was also detected by the analysis of molecular variance, and pairwise FST values. Furthermore, the results of this study revealed a pattern of high nucleotide homology among the adjacent populations, and a small number of nucleotide changes among disjunct populations, leading us to conclude that there is a genetic connectivity among the populations of P.hamrur inhabiting the coastal waters of India.

Bulls eye, Priacanthus hamrur, mitochondrial DNA, cyt-b, genetic diversity