Biogeography and Historical Demography of the Juan Fernández Rock Lobster, Jasus frontalis (Milne Edwards, 1837)

The genetic structure of present-day populations has been highly affected by glacial periods and physical oceanographic forcing, particularly with respect to species distributions and population gene-flow patterns. We assessed the current genetic composition of the Jasus frontalis population in the southeastern Pacific Islands off the coast of Chile to evaluate their connectivity modulated by contemporary and historic oceanographic processes. Population structure and demographical history for this species were assessed based on classic and Bayesian approaches using 84 sequences of cytochrome oxidase subunit I. In addition, we estimated the time of origin of J. frontalis in the different geographic zones. The analyses show a panmictic population with high gene flow between subcomponents and a lack of genetic structure (FST < 0.008). This high gene flow is mainly modulated by mesoscale oceanographic factors such as eddies and meanders. In a historical spatial context, the most probable common ancestor of J. frontalis could have colonized the region around 0.258 million years before present (MYBP), first becoming established in the Juan Fernandez Archipelago and then expanding toward the Desventuradas Islands. The demographic history shows a consistent increase in the effective population size (Ne) starting approximately 0.130 MYBP, which is highly correlated with sea-level changes during the last glacial maximum.