MOLECULAR IDENTIFICATION AND MORPHOLOGICAL CHARACTERISTIC OF Lutjanus lutjanus and Lutjanus vitta FROM TERENGGANU

Abstract

Snapper is a fish that belong to family Lutjanidae and order Perciformes.  It can be found at tropical and subtropical mangrove habitats and reef from depth ranging from 100m to 500m. Lutjanus lutjanus and Lutjanus vitta are two of the snappers found inhibiting Malaysia coastal waters including Terengganu. However, both species has almost the similar morphological features and identification via morphology only is insufficient. A total of 60 samples were collected from Besut, Kuala Nerus, Kuala Terengganu, and Marang. The samples were firstly identified via morphometric and meristic characterization with 39 morphological characters were measured and 7 meristic characters were counted. A total of 10 samples that has many overlapping morphological features were chosen to undergo molecular identification via DNA barcoding using CO1 gene. Results revealed all morphological characteristics for both species except the number of gills rakers for L. vitta, were matched the description from previous study. Molecular identification showed 5 samples were identified as L. Lutjanus while another 5 samples were L. vitta with 99 % of percentage identical. The constructed phylogenetic using Neighbour Joining method with Kimura-2 Parameter (K2P) model indicate that both species were divided into their own clades. The result further confirmed the identity of the fish species that previously identified via morphometric measurement and meristic count as L. lutjanus, and L. vitta, respectively. The study proved that DNA barcoding is very helpful in determining the identity of fish with ambiguity in morphological characteristics. For future research, it is recommended to use fresh samples, increase the number of samples from other states and continue to validate the identity via DNA barcoding using CO1 gene.