What is a DORADOID? What it is not is a new race of cyborgs from the Dr. Who reboot. A doradoid is a member of the superfamily Doradoidea, comprised of two families of Neotropical catfishes: Auchenipteridae (wood cats) and Doradidae (thorny cats). The two families are sister groups, each other’s closest relatives, descended from a common ancestor that excludes all other catfishes - and that makes Doradoidea monophyletic. The monophyly of Doradoidea has been accepted for a long time, and is well supported by morphological and molecular evidence. However, relationships within Doradoidea have escaped comprehensive analysis…until now. Earlier this week José L. O. Birindelli at Universidade Estadual de Londrina, Brazil, published his monumental phylogenetic revision of Doradoidea in the journal Neotropical Ichthyology. His epic study analyzed 311 morphological characters in all doradoid genera including 57 species-level taxa of doradids and 23 species of Auchenipteridae. To determine the position of Doradoidea within Siluriformes, representatives of 16 other catfish families were added to his analysis. Major findings include strong support for a sister group relationship between South American Doradoidea and African Mochokidae, with that group most closely related to another group composed of Aspredinidae (banjo cats), Erethistidae (moth cats) and Sisoridae (hill-stream cats). Birindelli also described a new doradid subfamily (Wertheimerinae) and a new doradid genus (Tenellus). The study is remarkably detailed and richly illustrated for the diversity of doradoid taxa and morphology used to establish their relationships. Birindelli is the world’s expert on doradoids, having studied the group for his masters thesis (2006) and doctoral dissertation (2010). His current publication is a culmination of a decade of work informed by the examination of 1000s of specimens in museums on three continents, extensive fieldwork in Brazil and Venezuela, and collaborative studies with a long list of Neotropical ichthyologists. Cheers! Birindelli 2014 available at: dx.doi.org/10.1590/1982-0224-20120027
Posted on: Fri, 03 Oct 2014 19:31:55 +0000
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