Phylogenetic analysis of Pallisentis nagpurensis (Acanthocephala: Quadrigyridae) infecting snakehead murrel Channa striata in Himachal Pradesh, India.

Till date 34 species of Pallisentis have been validated with almost negligible studies on its molecular phylogeny. The discovered species of the genus Pallisentis are confined only to the Asian continent. Many different species of Acanthocephala infecting commercially important freshwater as well as the marine fishes have been recorded from India mainly on the basis of morphology. The original record of morphological characteristics of Pallisentis nagpurensis (Bhalerao 1931) Baylis, 1933 can be traced back to the Bhalerao, 1931 from Channa striata (Ophiocephalus striatus) from the state of Uttar Pradesh, India without the separate documentation of male and female characteristics. Same species has also been reported to infect Channa striata from different parts of India as well as from the Indonesia and Ceylon (Baylis, 1933 and Fernando and Furtado, 1963). The present study compiles the morphological characteristics of male and female P. nagpurensis along with the comparison with similar species from same geographical region. This study also reports the first record of 18S, 28S rRNA and ITS1-5.8S-ITS2 gene sequences of P. nagpurensis generated for analyzing the phylogeny within this taxonomic group. P. nagpurensis together with the other species of Pallisentis reported from India distinctly formed a sub-clade separating it from the other members of same genus. © Indian Society for Parasitology 2021.