Phylogeography of the Neotropical catfish Pimelodus albicans (Siluriformes: Pimelodidae) from río de la Plata basin, South America, and conservation remarks

Pimelodus albicans Valenciennes, 1840 (common name "moncholo" or "bagre blanco") is an endemic species of the family Pimelodidae in the río de la Plata basin. Phylogenetic approach based on cytochrome b sequences was performed to test the existence of a unique evolutionary lineage in P. albicans and to discriminate populations units or subpopulations related to a migration behavior of this taxon in the río de la Plata basin. This study included 34 samples of P. albicans of different collecting sites in the río de la Plata estuary and in the río Arrecifes belonging to the río Paraná basin. Among 614 base pairs in the cytochrome b sequence data set, 203 were variable and 120 were phylogenetically informative sites in P. albicans. A total of twenty haplotypes, nucleotide diversity (π) = 0.032 and haplotype diversity = 0.941 were found. Tajima's test showed significant value D= -1.88 (p