Phylogeny reconciles classification in Antarctic plunderfishes

The resolution of phylogenetic relationships within rapid radiations poses a significant challenge in systematic biology. However, the integration of genomic-scale DNA data with multispecies coalescent-based tree inference methods offers a strategy to resolve historically recalcitrant nodes within radiations of closely-related species. Here, we analyze a dataset of over 60,000 loci captured via double digest restriction site-associated DNA sequencing (ddRADseq) using both concatenation- and coalescent-based approaches to infer the phylogenetic relationships of the Antarctic notothenioid lineage Artedidraconinae. Previous studies identify artedidraconines as the most rapidly-diversifying subclade of notothenioids, but evolutionary studies of the clade are stymied by pervasive phylogenetic and taxonomic uncertainty. The results of our phylogenomic analyses provide clarity to several long-standing challenges in the systematics of artedidraconines, including the deep paraphyly of Artedidraco. This work enables the construction of a classification that reflects phylogenetic relationships, including the description of a new genus and the resurrection of a classification of Notothenioidei that places Artedidraconinae as a subfamily of Harpagiferidae. This work provides a phylogenetic perspective for investigations of the tempo and mode of diversification in artedidraconines, which is likely to provide new insights on the dynamics of the notothenioid adaptive radiation as a whole.