TY - GEN A1 - Paijmans, Johanna L. A. A1 - Barlow, Axel A1 - Förster, Daniel W. A1 - Henneberger, Kirstin A1 - Meyer, Matthias A1 - Nickel, Birgit A1 - Nagel, Doris A1 - Worsøe Havmøller, Rasmus A1 - Baryshnikov, Gennady F. A1 - Joger, Ulrich A1 - Rosendahl, Wilfried A1 - Hofreiter, Michael T1 - Historical biogeography of the leopard (Panthera pardus) and its extinct Eurasian populations T2 - Postprints der Universität Potsdam Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftliche Reihe N2 - Background Resolving the historical biogeography of the leopard (Panthera pardus) is a complex issue, because patterns inferred from fossils and from molecular data lack congruence. Fossil evidence supports an African origin, and suggests that leopards were already present in Eurasia during the Early Pleistocene. Analysis of DNA sequences however, suggests a more recent, Middle Pleistocene shared ancestry of Asian and African leopards. These contrasting patterns led researchers to propose a two-stage hypothesis of leopard dispersal out of Africa: an initial Early Pleistocene colonisation of Asia and a subsequent replacement by a second colonisation wave during the Middle Pleistocene. The status of Late Pleistocene European leopards within this scenario is unclear: were these populations remnants of the first dispersal, or do the last surviving European leopards share more recent ancestry with their African counterparts? Results In this study, we generate and analyse mitogenome sequences from historical samples that span the entire modern leopard distribution, as well as from Late Pleistocene remains. We find a deep bifurcation between African and Eurasian mitochondrial lineages (~ 710 Ka), with the European ancient samples as sister to all Asian lineages (~ 483 Ka). The modern and historical mainland Asian lineages share a relatively recent common ancestor (~ 122 Ka), and we find one Javan sample nested within these. Conclusions The phylogenetic placement of the ancient European leopard as sister group to Asian leopards suggests that these populations originate from the same out-of-Africa dispersal which founded the Asian lineages. The coalescence time found for the mitochondrial lineages aligns well with the earliest undisputed fossils in Eurasia, and thus encourages a re-evaluation of the identification of the much older putative leopard fossils from the region. The relatively recent ancestry of all mainland Asian leopard lineages suggests that these populations underwent a severe population bottleneck during the Pleistocene. Finally, although only based on a single sample, the unexpected phylogenetic placement of the Javan leopard could be interpreted as evidence for exchange of mitochondrial lineages between Java and mainland Asia, calling for further investigation into the evolutionary history of this subspecies. T3 - Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftliche Reihe - 505 KW - Ancient DNA KW - Hybridisation capture KW - Leopards KW - Mitochondrial genomes KW - Mitogenomes KW - mtDNA KW - Palaeogenetics KW - Panthera pardus Y1 - 2019 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-422555 SN - 1866-8372 IS - 505 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Paijmans, Johanna L. A. A1 - Barlow, Axel A1 - Förster, Daniel W. A1 - Henneberger, Kirstin A1 - Meyer, Matthias A1 - Nickel, Birgit A1 - Nagel, Doris A1 - Worsøe Havmøller, Rasmus A1 - Baryshnikov, Gennady F. A1 - Joger, Ulrich A1 - Rosendahl, Wilfried A1 - Hofreiter, Michael T1 - Historical biogeography of the leopard (Panthera pardus) and its extinct Eurasian populations JF - BMC Evolutionary Biology N2 - Background Resolving the historical biogeography of the leopard (Panthera pardus) is a complex issue, because patterns inferred from fossils and from molecular data lack congruence. Fossil evidence supports an African origin, and suggests that leopards were already present in Eurasia during the Early Pleistocene. Analysis of DNA sequences however, suggests a more recent, Middle Pleistocene shared ancestry of Asian and African leopards. These contrasting patterns led researchers to propose a two-stage hypothesis of leopard dispersal out of Africa: an initial Early Pleistocene colonisation of Asia and a subsequent replacement by a second colonisation wave during the Middle Pleistocene. The status of Late Pleistocene European leopards within this scenario is unclear: were these populations remnants of the first dispersal, or do the last surviving European leopards share more recent ancestry with their African counterparts? Results In this study, we generate and analyse mitogenome sequences from historical samples that span the entire modern leopard distribution, as well as from Late Pleistocene remains. We find a deep bifurcation between African and Eurasian mitochondrial lineages (~ 710 Ka), with the European ancient samples as sister to all Asian lineages (~ 483 Ka). The modern and historical mainland Asian lineages share a relatively recent common ancestor (~ 122 Ka), and we find one Javan sample nested within these. Conclusions The phylogenetic placement of the ancient European leopard as sister group to Asian leopards suggests that these populations originate from the same out-of-Africa dispersal which founded the Asian lineages. The coalescence time found for the mitochondrial lineages aligns well with the earliest undisputed fossils in Eurasia, and thus encourages a re-evaluation of the identification of the much older putative leopard fossils from the region. The relatively recent ancestry of all mainland Asian leopard lineages suggests that these populations underwent a severe population bottleneck during the Pleistocene. Finally, although only based on a single sample, the unexpected phylogenetic placement of the Javan leopard could be interpreted as evidence for exchange of mitochondrial lineages between Java and mainland Asia, calling for further investigation into the evolutionary history of this subspecies. KW - Ancient DNA KW - Hybridisation capture KW - Leopards KW - Mitochondrial genomes KW - Mitogenomes KW - mtDNA KW - Palaeogenetics KW - Panthera pardus Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1186/s12862-018-1268-0 SN - 1471-2148 VL - 18 IS - 156 PB - BioMed Central und Springer CY - London, Berlin und Heidelberg ER -