Genetic Structure of Blue Ling, Molva dypterygia, in the North Atlantic

The blue ling, a deep-water fish widespread in the Northeast Atlantic, has suffered major population declines from intensive fishing since the 1970s. Individuals sampled from four Norwegian fjords and offshore locations, including the Norwegian shelf, Faroe Islands, Rockall, Iceland and Greenland, were genotyped at 61 SNP loci. Results revealed weak but significant overall differentiation (F _ST  = 0.005***) and no evidence of isolation by distance. While fjord and offshore groups showed no broad genetic separation, Yrkefjord displayed a distinct pattern relative to most other locations, warranting further investigation. Moreover, linkage disequilibrium analysis of SNPs produced a PCA pattern consistent with the characteristic three-band structure associated with chromosomal inversions.