Genetic structure of wild brown sole inferred from mitochondrial DNA analysis

The population structure of brown sole was examined in a total of 308 samples collected from three geographical groups: one locality (Gangneung) on the east side of the Korean Peninsula, two localities (Erimo and Tomakomai) on the southeastern side and four localities (Onishika, Teshio, Tomamae and Yoichi) on the northwestern side of Hokkaido Island, Japan, by using sequences of 484 bp from the 5' end of the control region of mtDNA. We detected 225 haplotypes, but 183 of them were unique to an individual. A total of 116 nucleotide sites were variable. Haplotype diversity (h) was very high, ranging from 0.989 to 1.000, and nucleotide diversity (${\pi}$) was detected between 0.015 and 0.022. Genetic distances (${\Phi}_{ST}$) within populations, among populations and among geographical groups were low (0.0002 to 0.0014). No significant difference was detected by the AMOVA test (P < 0.05). Pairwise $F_{ST}$ values between sampling localities were also low and not significant. Genetic differentiation was not detected among sampling localities.