Complete mitochondrial genome of Porzana fusca and Porzana pusilla and phylogenetic relationship of 16 Rallidae species

Characterization of the complete mitogenomes of Baillon's Crake Porzana pusilla and phylogenetic analysis

The complete mitochondrial genome of the Baillon's Crake Porzana pusilla (Gruiformes: Rallidae) are sequenced and annotated, which contained 37 typical genes. The length of the complete mitochondrial genome is 16,966 bp (GenBank No. MW043485), with As, Ts, Cs, Gs, and AT content of the mitochondrial genome is 32.1, 23.2, 30.9, 13.8, and 55.3%, respectively. All protein-coding genes started with ATN except COX1 and ND5, which start with GTG, and all protein-coding genes end with a complete triplet codon (TAA, AGG, AGA, and TAG), except COX3, which ends with an incomplete T. The ND3 gene of P. pusilla with an extra C nucleotide in 174 site. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that the new sequenced species of P. pusilla was closer to the clade of Porzana fusca and Porzana paykullii, and all three Porzana are clustered into one branch.

Phylogenomic Reconstruction Sheds Light on New Relationships and Timescale of Rails (Aves: Rallidae) Evolution

The integration of state-of-the-art molecular techniques and analyses, together with a broad taxonomic sampling, can provide new insights into bird interrelationships and divergence. Despite their evolutionary significance, the relationships among several rail lineages remain unresolved as does the general timescale of rail evolution. Here, we disentangle the deep phylogenetic structure of rails using anchored phylogenomics. We analysed a set of 393 loci from 63 species, representing approximately 40% of the extant familial diversity. Our phylogenomic analyses reconstruct the phylogeny of rails and robustly infer several previously contentious relationships. Concatenated maximum likelihood and coalescent species-tree approaches recover identical topologies with strong node support. The results are concordant with previous phylogenetic studies using small DNA datasets, but they also supply an additional resolution. Our dating analysis provides contrasting divergence times using fossils and Bayesian and non-Bayesian approaches. Our study refines the evolutionary history of rails, offering a foundation for future evolutionary studies of birds.