A phylogenetic analysis of the subspecies of Salvelinus malma (Dolly Varden char) was done using DNA sequences from the first internal transcribed spacer (ITS1) of the ribosomal DNA (rDNA). Sequences were obtained from the northern S. malma malma from the Noatak River, Alaska, and the Kamchatka River, Russia; from the southern North American form S. malma lordi from the Fox River, Kenai peninsula, and Auke Bay near Juneau, Alaska; and from the southern Asian form S. malma krascheninnikovi from Belaya River in Sakhalin Island, Russia. These sequences were combined with others from Salvelinus alpinus (Arctic char) from several locations in the North Pacific and Europe and analyzed using maximum parsimony and neighbor joining algorithms with Salvelinus namaycush (lake trout) as an outgroup. The resulting trees had two well-supported groups: S. m. malma and S. m. krascheninnikovi in one group and S. m. lordi and various populations of S. alpinus in the other. Salvelinus m. malma and S. m. krascheninnikovi were sister taxa, and S. m. lordi was most closely related to S. alpinus from Northwest Territories (S. a. erythrinus). New chromosome data from S. m. malma from northwestern Alaska supported the three named subspecies because S. m. malma from both Alaska and Russia have 2n = 78 compared with 2n = 82 for the two southern forms and the location of the nuclear organizer regions (NORs) was different in each of the three subspecies.
Is isolation by adaptation driving genetic divergence among proximate Dolly Varden char populations?
