Population genetic structure of wolves in the northwestern Dinaric‐Balkan region
The Balkan Peninsula and the Dinaric Mountains possess extraordinary biodiversity and support one of the largest and most diverse wolf (Canis lupus) populations in Europe. Results obtained with diverse genetic markers show west‐east substructure, also seen in various other species, despite the absen...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:8717286 2023-05-15T15:50:43+02:00 Population genetic structure of wolves in the northwestern Dinaric‐Balkan region Šnjegota, Dragana Stronen, Astrid Vik Boljte, Barbara Ćirović, Duško Djan, Mihajla Huber, Djuro Jelenčič, Maja Konec, Marjeta Kusak, Josip Skrbinšek, Tomaž 2021-12-12 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8717286/ https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.8444 en eng John Wiley and Sons Inc. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8717286/ http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.8444 © 2021 The Authors. Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. CC-BY Ecol Evol Research Articles Text 2021 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.8444 2022-01-09T01:40:58Z The Balkan Peninsula and the Dinaric Mountains possess extraordinary biodiversity and support one of the largest and most diverse wolf (Canis lupus) populations in Europe. Results obtained with diverse genetic markers show west‐east substructure, also seen in various other species, despite the absence of obvious barriers to movement. However, the spatial extent of the genetic clusters remains unresolved, and our aim was to combine fine‐scale sampling with population and spatial genetic analyses to improve resolution of wolf genetic clusters. We analyzed 16 autosomal microsatellites from 255 wolves sampled in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BIH), and Serbia and documented three genetic clusters. These comprised (1) Slovenia and the regions of Gorski kotar and Lika in Croatia, (2) the region of Dalmatia in southern Croatia and BIH, and (3) Serbia. When we mapped the clusters geographically, we observed west‐east genetic structure across the study area, together with some specific structure in BIH–Dalmatia. We observed that cluster 1 had a smaller effective population size, consistent with earlier reports of population recovery since the 1980s. Our results provide foundation for future genomic studies that would further resolve the observed west‐east population structure and its evolutionary history in wolves and other taxa in the region and identify focal areas for habitat conservation. They also have immediate importance for conservation planning for the wolves in one of the most important parts of the species’ European range. Text Canis lupus PubMed Central (PMC) Ecology and Evolution 11 24 18492 18504 |
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Research Articles |
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Research Articles Šnjegota, Dragana Stronen, Astrid Vik Boljte, Barbara Ćirović, Duško Djan, Mihajla Huber, Djuro Jelenčič, Maja Konec, Marjeta Kusak, Josip Skrbinšek, Tomaž Population genetic structure of wolves in the northwestern Dinaric‐Balkan region |
topic_facet |
Research Articles |
description |
The Balkan Peninsula and the Dinaric Mountains possess extraordinary biodiversity and support one of the largest and most diverse wolf (Canis lupus) populations in Europe. Results obtained with diverse genetic markers show west‐east substructure, also seen in various other species, despite the absence of obvious barriers to movement. However, the spatial extent of the genetic clusters remains unresolved, and our aim was to combine fine‐scale sampling with population and spatial genetic analyses to improve resolution of wolf genetic clusters. We analyzed 16 autosomal microsatellites from 255 wolves sampled in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BIH), and Serbia and documented three genetic clusters. These comprised (1) Slovenia and the regions of Gorski kotar and Lika in Croatia, (2) the region of Dalmatia in southern Croatia and BIH, and (3) Serbia. When we mapped the clusters geographically, we observed west‐east genetic structure across the study area, together with some specific structure in BIH–Dalmatia. We observed that cluster 1 had a smaller effective population size, consistent with earlier reports of population recovery since the 1980s. Our results provide foundation for future genomic studies that would further resolve the observed west‐east population structure and its evolutionary history in wolves and other taxa in the region and identify focal areas for habitat conservation. They also have immediate importance for conservation planning for the wolves in one of the most important parts of the species’ European range. |
format |
Text |
author |
Šnjegota, Dragana Stronen, Astrid Vik Boljte, Barbara Ćirović, Duško Djan, Mihajla Huber, Djuro Jelenčič, Maja Konec, Marjeta Kusak, Josip Skrbinšek, Tomaž |
author_facet |
Šnjegota, Dragana Stronen, Astrid Vik Boljte, Barbara Ćirović, Duško Djan, Mihajla Huber, Djuro Jelenčič, Maja Konec, Marjeta Kusak, Josip Skrbinšek, Tomaž |
author_sort |
Šnjegota, Dragana |
title |
Population genetic structure of wolves in the northwestern Dinaric‐Balkan region |
title_short |
Population genetic structure of wolves in the northwestern Dinaric‐Balkan region |
title_full |
Population genetic structure of wolves in the northwestern Dinaric‐Balkan region |
title_fullStr |
Population genetic structure of wolves in the northwestern Dinaric‐Balkan region |
title_full_unstemmed |
Population genetic structure of wolves in the northwestern Dinaric‐Balkan region |
title_sort |
population genetic structure of wolves in the northwestern dinaric‐balkan region |
publisher |
John Wiley and Sons Inc. |
publishDate |
2021 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8717286/ https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.8444 |
genre |
Canis lupus |
genre_facet |
Canis lupus |
op_source |
Ecol Evol |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8717286/ http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.8444 |
op_rights |
© 2021 The Authors. Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.8444 |
container_title |
Ecology and Evolution |
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11 |
container_issue |
24 |
container_start_page |
18492 |
op_container_end_page |
18504 |
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1766385725323870208 |