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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Journal of Fish Biology<BR>Volume 74 Issue 2, Pages
329 - 356<BR>Published Online: 29 Jan 2009<BR></DIV></FONT>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT size=4>The campaign to DNA barcode all
fishes, FISH-BOL<BR></FONT>R. D. Ward*†, R. Hanner‡ P. D. N. Hebert‡ <BR>*
CSIRO Wealth from Oceans Flagship, CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research, GPO
Box 1538, Hobart, Tasmania 7001, Australia and ‡ Biodiversity
Institute of Ontario and Department of Integrative Biology, University of
Guelph, Ontario, Canada <BR>Correspondence to †Tel.: +61 3 6232
5370; fax: +61 3 6232 5000; email: bob.ward@csiro.au
<BR><BR><BR><STRONG>ABSTRACT</STRONG><BR>FISH-BOL, the Fish Barcode of Life
campaign, is an international research collaboration that is assembling a
standardized reference DNA sequence library for all fishes. Analysis is
targeting a 648 base pair region of the mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase I
(COI) gene. More than 5000 species have already been DNA barcoded, with an
average of five specimens per species, typically vouchers with authoritative
identifications. The barcode sequence from any fish, fillet, fin, egg or larva
can be matched against these reference sequences using BOLD; the Barcode of Life
Data System (http://www.barcodinglife.org). The benefits of barcoding fishes
include facilitating species identification, highlighting cases of range
expansion for known species, flagging previously overlooked species and enabling
identifications where traditional methods cannot be applied. Results thus far
indicate that barcodes separate c. 98 and 93% of already described marine and
freshwater fish species, respectively. Several specimens with divergent barcode
sequences have been confirmed by integrative taxonomic analysis as new species.
Past concerns in relation to the use of fish barcoding for species
discrimination are discussed. These include hybridization, recent radiations,
regional differentiation in barcode sequences and nuclear copies of the barcode
region. However, current results indicate these issues are of little concern for
the great majority of specimens.</FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>