Associação entre variáveis taxonômicas e ambientais com a forma de otólitos

Abstract

Sagital otoliths were analyzed trying to identify possible relationships among shape groups and environmental, biological and taxonomical variables of fishes. Five hundred otoliths images of different species were obtained. Cluster analysis by Ward's criterion was used in order to form similar otolith groups based on their shapes. This method was applied at two different times: 1) using a matrix of normalized Fourier coefficients, obtained by Fourier Elliptical analysis and Euclidean distance as similarity measure; and 2) using a similarity matrix produced by "TO distance ". Thirteen otolith morphotypes, validated by the silhouette graph, were obtained from both procedures. However, "TO distance" was more efficient, getting more heterogeneous shapes among groups and homogeneous shapes within them. Based on the groups obtained from “TO Distance”, simple correlation analysis was carried out to investigate the relationship among otolith shapes and fish variables. Results showed that the variables related to sulcus acusticus, such as position, depth and shape, were the most significant, getting a percentage of explanation of 100% of the total variability among shape groups. It follows that the results presented here can help to explain how otolith shape varies in function of fish species characteristics.