DNA barcoding of common medicinal snakes in China / 中国药学杂志

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: To establish a DNA barcode database of common medicinal snakes in China for species identification and phylogenetic analysis. METHODS: The COI barcode sequences of 44 samples from 23 snake species were amplified and sequenced. The aligned sequences, 658 base pairs in length, were analyzed for divergence using the Kimura-2-parameter distance model with MEGA5.0. RESULTS: The genetic distance and NJ tree demonstrated that there were 277 variable sites in species, the intraspe-cific K2P distance ranged from 0-0.0409, the interspecific genetic distance ranged from 0.085 0-0.2568, and there was significant difference between the interspecific genetic distance and intraspecific genetic distance. The minimum interspecific distance was 0.0850 between Lycodon synaptor and Lycodon ruhstrati. The maximum interspecific distance was 0.2568 between Elaphe radiate and Naja atra. The snakes examined in this study were clustered in three major clades corresponding to their three families. Each species formed a monophyletic clad. CONCLUSION: DNA barcoding based on the COI sequences is accurate and reliable and could be applied to identify the common medicinal snakes in our study. The study provides new information for the phylogenetic relationships of snake species.