Genetic analysis of mitochondrial ND5 gene of siberian ibex (Capra Sibirica, Pallas, 1776) population in Mongolia

• Published in: Proceedings of the Mongolian Academy of Sciences
• Main Authors: Tsenddorj Bilguun, Baatar Delgerzul, Zunduibaatar Unudbayasgalan, Baranz Galbadrakh, Batsukh Tserendulam
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English; Mongolian; Russian
• Published: Mongolian Academy of Sciences 2019
• Subjects: siberian ibex; mitochondrial nd5 gene; haplotype; population genetic diversity; capra sibirica; Science; Q; Social Sciences; H; taiga
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.5564/pmas.v59i3.1246; https://doaj.org/article/63638e697dc140279d3195139a17dad6

The Siberian ibex (Capra sibirica) from Central Asia is believed to be the most ancient species of the genus Capra. In Mongolia, it is distributed in the areas of Mongolian Altai, Gobi-Altai, Dzungaria, Altai, Khan Khuhii, Khoridal Saridag and Ulaan Taiga as well as in the desert and semi-desert steppe zones of Dundgobi and Dornogobi aimags (provinces). In the current study, we investigated the mitochondrial ND5 gene fragments of the Siberian ibex population from different parts of Mongolia. Nine haplotypes, including 6 shared and 3 unique haplotypes were identified among these populations. Furthermore, Tajima’s statistics and Fu’s statistics did not reveal significant positive value across the population, indicating population decline and balancing selection. In the phylogenetic tree by 9 haplotypes, no separated clusters were generated. In addition, nucleotide diversity was 0.015, haplotype diversity was 0.86 and the average number of differences in nucleotides was 8.2 in the overall population. These results suggest that genetic diversity across all the populations was low, while haplotype diversity and the average number of differences in nucleotides were high.