Cladistics of the Lernaeidae (Cyclopoida), a major family of freshwater fish parasites

Currently about 110 species of lernaeid copepods are known from 332 species of freshwater fishes belonging to 161 genera in 41 families. Fourteen lernaeid genera are recognized in this study with two of them Lamproglena and Lernaea, containing the bulk of the species (81/113 or 71.7%). Two trees were obtained from a cladistic analysis with length of 14 steps, consistency index of 92 and a retention index of 97. The adopted phylogenetic hypothesis shows that the Lernaeidae can be divided into two subfamilies: Lernaeinae (including Areotrachelus, Dysphorus, Lernaea, Lernaeogiraffa, Opistholernaea, Pillainus, Taurocheros) and Lamprogleinae (including Afrolernaea, Catlaphilla, Indolernaea, Indopeniculus, Lamproglena, Lamproglenoides, Pseudolamproglena); while the Lernaeinae have wide geographic distribution, members of the Lamprogleninae are confined to Africa and Asia. Analysis of the area cladogram revealed that this pattern of uneven distribution has resulted from an explosive cladogenesis of the Lamprogleninae on the mobile ‘Indian Raftʹ in the Tertiary, before collision of this subcontinent with the Asian continent.