Alejandro Mendivil Malpica - Phylogenomics of Aplysia sea hares from the Eastern Pacific

Original illustrations of Aplysia species described from Peru. (A) Aplysia lessonii (from Rang, 1828). (B) Aplysia inca (from d’Orbingy, 1837). (C) Aplysia nigra (from d’Orbingy, 1837). (D) Aplysia rangiana (from d’Orbingy, 1837). (E) Aplysia chierchiana (from Mazzarelli & Zuccardi, 1890).

Home institution and supervisors
Rina Ramirez. UNMSM, Peru.

Host institution and supervisors
Michael D. Martin, Jaime Morin. NTNU, Norway. 2023.

Project description
Sea hares within the genus Aplysia (Mollusca: Heterobranchia) comprise around 45 species that can be grouped into three subgenera (Aplysia, Varria and Pruvotaplysia) and have been the subject of many physiological, anatomical and ecological studies. However, due to the wide morphological and ontogenetic variation of the sea hares, the taxonomy of Aplysia is still unresolved in many regions around the world. One of the regions that critically requires a taxonomic revision of Aplysia is the Eastern Pacific, where there have been described many species, mainly from Peru and California. However, many of these species have been poorly studied.

To resolve the systematics of the genus Aplysia in the Eastern Pacific, the identities of these species need to be verified based on molecular phylogenetics, including samples of California and Central America. This project will use a genome skimming and reference-guided assembly approach to sequence whole mitogenomes from Aplysia specimens in museum collections. Then a phylogenetic analysis will be conducted in order to further resolve the species’ taxonomic relationships.