A comparative chromosome study on five Minnow fishes (Cyprinidae, Cypriniformes) in Thailand

The cytogenetic comparisons of five Minnow species from Thailand were presented here, i.e., Devario regina, D. laoensis, Rasbora paviana, R. aurotaenia and Esomus metalicus. The mitotic chromosomes were prepared directly from renal cells. Conventional staining and Ag-NOR banding techniques were applied to stain the chromosomes. The results revealed that all Minnow fishes studied possessed the same diploid chromosome number (2n) as 50 chromosomes. The fundamental numbers (NF) of D. laoensis, D. regina, R. paviana, R. aurotaenia and E. metalicus are 100, 100, 98, 98, and 98 respectively. Their karyotypes composing of metacentrics-submetacentrics-acrocentrics-telocentrics were as follows: 6-12-32-0 in D. regina, 6-10-34-0 in D. laoensis, 8-16-24-2 in R. paviana, 8-16-24-2 in R. aurotaenia and 8-10-30-2 in E. metalicus. The Ag-NOR banding technique provides the nucleolar organizer regions (NORs) at subtelomeric region of the short arm chromosome in the a submetacentric or acrocentric chromosomes that are located differently in the different chromosome pairs among species.