Morphometrics, meristics and molecular genetics of snakehead fish in Malaysia

Abstract

Most of the Southeast Asian countries including Malaysia, 70% of the protein sources come from fish. Fish and aquatic organisms constitute a major portion of Malaysian diets. The snakehead fishes play an important role among the freshwater food fish species. There are six species of snakehead fish in Malaysia, namely Channa marulioides, C. melasoma, C. lucius, C. gachua, C. micropeltes, and C. striatus. Some aspects of morphology and molecular genetics of these species were conducted in this study. The main objectives of this study were (i) to taxonomy snakehead species of Malaysia based on morphology, (ii) to detect genetic variation among snakehead species in Peninsular Malaysia using RAPD, (iii) to definite the phylogeny of Channidae using mitochondria (iv) to design specific primer (Microsatellite method) for snakehead species.