ABSTRACT
For this review, information from GenBank was retrieved on 18 January, 2009. Up to that point a total of 5779 gobioid nucleotide sequences had been submitted (see Tables 1.2.1, 1.2.2). Th e fi rst submission of a gobioid nucleotide sequence was a 1410 bp long fragment of the rhodopsin gene from the sand goby Pomatoschistus minutus in 1991 (Archer et al., 1992; accession number X62405), followed by a 1440 bp fragment of DRP2, a novel human dystrophin homologue from an unidentifi ed species of Gobius (Roberts et al., 1996; accession number GSU43518). Th e third nucleotide submission had a systematic component and involved six accessions of partial cytochrome b (cob) sequences (365 bp) of Proterorhinus marmoratus and Neogobius melanostoma (Dougherty et al., 1996; accessions NMU53673NMU53677 and PMU53678). The 5799 accession numbers corresponded to 178 individual submissions ranging from 281 accessions per submission in one case to just one accession in 21 occasions. For a total of 1190 accession numbers, information regarding their publication in a scientifi c journal was missing. Some of these might not have been published at the time of access, but a ‘Title’ search in ISI Web of Knowledge revealed that several were indeed published without showing the corresponding reference details in the GenBank entry. Although GenBank now routinely checks several major journals for accession numbers upon publication and then updates the corresponding ‘Journal’ fi eld in the submission, authors should ensure that their GenBank entries are updated once the sequences are published or otherwise risk that their research is not readily accessible through GenBank. Most journals now require that sequences be deposited in GenBank prior to publication but it is still possible that a number of gobioid nucleotide sequences have been published without being deposited in GenBank. Remarkably, the total number of nucleotide sequences for cyprinids and cichlids is 30 and 8 times higher, respectively, than those submitted for gobioids (see Table 1.2.1). Th e top fi ve gobioid species represented in the nucleotide sequence data bank are (number of entries in brackets): Gobiomorphus breviceps (485), Ctenogobiops feroculus (318), Gillichthys mirabilis (227), Gnatholepis scapulostigma (192), and Gnatholepis anjerensis (158).
