TY  - JOUR
A1  - Casas-Marce, Mireia
A1  - Marmesat, Elena
A1  - Soriano, Laura
A1  - Martinez-Cruz, Begona
A1  - Lucena-Perez, Maria
A1  - Nocete, Francisco
A1  - Rodriguez-Hidalgo, Antonio
A1  - Canals, Antoni
A1  - Nadal, Jordi
A1  - Detry, Cleia
A1  - Bernaldez-Sanchez, Eloisa
A1  - Fernandez-Rodriguez, Carlos
A1  - Perez-Ripoll, Manuel
A1  - Stiller, Mathias
A1  - Hofreiter, Michael
A1  - Rodriguez, Alejandro
A1  - Revilla, Eloy
A1  - Delibes, Miguel
A1  - Godoy, Jose A.
T1  - Spatiotemporal Dynamics of Genetic Variation in the Iberian Lynx along Its Path to Extinction Reconstructed with Ancient DNA
JF  - Molecular biology and evolution
N2  - There is the tendency to assume that endangered species have been both genetically and demographically healthier in the past, so that any genetic erosion observed today was caused by their recent decline. The Iberian lynx (Lynx pardinus) suffered a dramatic and continuous decline during the 20th century, and now shows extremely low genome- and species-wide genetic diversity among other signs of genomic erosion. We analyze ancient (N = 10), historical (N = 245), and contemporary (N = 172) samples with microsatellite and mitogenome data to reconstruct the species' demography and investigate patterns of genetic variation across space and time. Iberian lynx populations transitioned from low but significantly higher genetic diversity than today and shallow geographical differentiation millennia ago, through a structured metapopulation with varying levels of diversity during the last centuries, to two extremely genetically depauperate and differentiated remnant populations by 2002. The historical subpopulations show varying extents of genetic drift in relation to their recent size and time in isolation, but these do not predict whether the populations persisted or went finally extinct. In conclusion, current genetic patterns were mainly shaped by genetic drift, supporting the current admixture of the two genetic pools and calling for a comprehensive genetic management of the ongoing conservation program. This study illustrates how a retrospective analysis of demographic and genetic patterns of endangered species can shed light onto their evolutionary history and this, in turn, can inform conservation actions.
KW  - Iberian lynx
KW  - ancient DNA
KW  - paleogenetics
KW  - genetic erosion
KW  - endangered species
Y1  - 2017
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msx222
SN  - 0737-4038
SN  - 1537-1719
VL  - 34
SP  - 2893
EP  - 2907
PB  - Oxford Univ. Press
CY  - Oxford
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Lucena-Perez, María
A1  - Bazzicalupo, Enrico
A1  - Paijmans, Johanna
A1  - Kleinman-Ruiz, Daniel
A1  - Dalén, Love
A1  - Hofreiter, Michael
A1  - Delibes, Miguel
A1  - Clavero, Miguel
A1  - Godoy, José A.
T1  - Ancient genome provides insights into the history of Eurasian lynx in Iberia and Western Europe
JF  - Quaternary science reviews : the international multidisciplinary research and review journal
N2  - The Eurasian lynx (Lynx lynx) is one of the most widely distributed felids in the world. However, most of its populations started to decline a few millennia ago. Historical declines have been especially severe in Europe, and particularly in Western Europe, from where the species disappeared in the last few centuries. Here, we analyze the genome of an Eurasian lynx inhabiting the Iberian Peninsula 2500 ya, to gain insights into the phylogeographic position and genetic status of this extinct population. Also, we contextualize previous ancient data in the light of new phylogeographic studies of the species. Our results suggest that the Iberian population is part of an extinct European lineage closely related to the current Carpathian-Baltic lineages. Also, this sample holds the lowest diversity reported for the species so far, and similar to that of the highly endangered Iberian lynx. A combination of historical factors, such as a founder effect while colonizing the peninsula, together with intensified human impacts during the Holocene in the Cantabrian strip, could have led to a genetic impoverishment of the population and precipitated its extinction. Mitogenomic lineages distribution in space and time support the long-term coexistence of several lineages of Eurasian lynx in Western Europe with fluctuating ranges. While mitochondrial sequences related to the lineages currently found in Balkans and Caucasus were predominant during the Pleistocene, those more closely related to the lineage currently distributed in Central Europe prevailed during the Holocene. The use of ancient genomics has proven to be a useful tool to understand the biogeographic pattern of the Eurasian lynx in the past.
Y1  - 2022
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2022.107518
SN  - 0277-3791
SN  - 1873-457X
VL  - 285
PB  - Elsevier
CY  - Oxford
ER  -