The Asian green mussels (Perna viridis) belonging to the Family Mytilidae plays important
role due to its commercial value and feeding behaviour. Up to October 2013, there is no
genetic information Cytochrome Oxidase I (COI) gene of P. viridis from Malaysia deposited
in the GenBank. Thus, this study aims to sequence COI gene of P. viridis collected in
Santubong, Sarawak and study the morphology and genetic diversity of P. viridis sampled
from Santubong based on COI gene sequences analysis. A total of 12 Asian green mussels
were subjected to assesement of morphological characteristics. Detail of the colour shell,
shape and range shell morphology of all samples are similar to P. viridis. Approximately
550bp COI gene had been successfully sequenced. The genetic divergence values between
P. viridis in Santubong, Malaysia and China ranged from 0% to 0.3%. While genetic
divergence between P. viridis and other Perna sp. ranged from 60.2% to 60.5%. The
topologies of all constructed phylogenetic tree based on COI gene showed that P. viridis is
monophyletic since all P. viridis were grouped together forming one clade with 100%
bootstrap value. This study involved only limited samples thus could be regarded as
preliminary study only
