标题：Morphological and molecular phylogenetic analysis of Bivesicula claviformis Yamaguti, 1934 infecting the tomato hind Cephalopholis sonnerati (Serranidae) in Saudi Arabia
摘要：AbstractGroupers are large predators in the Serranidae family that feed on fish and small invertebrates. Identification of parasitic taxa of groupers was done concerning their morphological and biological characteristics. A total of 30Cephalopholis sonnerati(Serranidae) specimens were investigated for digenetic trematodes in the Red Sea, Saudi Arabia. Only one bivesiculid species, belonging to the Bivesiculidae family, has been identified, with a prevalence rate of 60% (18/30) among infected fish. TheBivesiculaspecies obtained from the fish host’s intestine is morphologically and morphometric compatible withBivesicula claviformis, which was previously identified fromEpinephelus fasciatus(Serranidae) in North Borneo. In addition, maximum parsimony based on Tamura-Nei model was utilized to determine the phylogeny of the recoveredBivesiculaspecies using partial small subunit ribosomal RNA gene (18S rRNA) and large subunit ribosomal RNA gene (28S rRNA) sequences. The query sequences showed the identities of 99.39% and 94.02% for18S(AJ287485.1) and28SrRNA (AY222182.1) of the previously describedBivesicula claviformis, respectively. The present study demonstrated thatBivesicula claviformisis the first reported of this genus as endoparasites fromC. sonnerati, as well as providing novel DNA data for this species.
