Approximately 50 Marsican bears live in the Apennine Mountains in Central Italy. This is the last population of native Italian brown bears, now completely isolated from recently introduced bears in the Alps and from all the other European populations. In order to reconstruct the demographic history of this group and the possible molecular adaptations (or maladaptations) due to independent evolution in a specific environment, and indirectly to evaluate the extinction risks and to suggest conservation strategies, we sequenced the complete genomes of 6 Marsican bears and 6 additional European brown bears from Spain, Greece, Slovakia, and the Alps. The coverage was around 20X for four individuals and around 5X for eight individuals. Preliminary analyses suggest that: Marsican genomes have about 2/3 of the number of SNPs observed in the Spanish bears, and 1/3 of the SNPs found in other European bears; Marsican bears are highly homogenous, and their genomes are similarly distant to all the other European individuals; several fixed non- synonymous substitutions are observed in the Marsican bears; long stretches of homozigosity are predominantly found in Marsican bears, suggesting that inbreeding might be an issue in this population; the pattern of population structure in Europe is weaker at the genomic than at the mitochondrial level; the isolation of the Marsican bear is probably older than previously estimated.

Benazzo, A.; Boitani, L.; Cahill, J.; Ciucci, P.; Cornetti, L.; Fumagalli, M.; Fuselli, S.; Ghirotto, S.; Delser, P.M.; Mona, S.; Ometto, L.; Orlando, L.; Panziera, A.; Rota Stabelli, O.; Shapiro, B.; Trucchi, E.; Vernesi, C.; Zanetti, E.; Bertorelle, G. (2015-09). The evolution of the small and isolated population of Apennine brown bears (Ursus arctos Marsicanus): a whole-genomes perspective. In: Evoluzione 2015: 6th Congress of the Italian Society for Evolutionary Biology, Bologna, Italy, 31 agosto-3 settembre 2015. Bologna: Università degli studi di Bologna: 39. ISBN: 9788879598828. handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10449/33251

The evolution of the small and isolated population of Apennine brown bears (Ursus arctos Marsicanus): a whole-genomes perspective

Ometto, Lino;Rota Stabelli, Omar;Vernesi, Cristiano;
2015-09-01

Abstract

Approximately 50 Marsican bears live in the Apennine Mountains in Central Italy. This is the last population of native Italian brown bears, now completely isolated from recently introduced bears in the Alps and from all the other European populations. In order to reconstruct the demographic history of this group and the possible molecular adaptations (or maladaptations) due to independent evolution in a specific environment, and indirectly to evaluate the extinction risks and to suggest conservation strategies, we sequenced the complete genomes of 6 Marsican bears and 6 additional European brown bears from Spain, Greece, Slovakia, and the Alps. The coverage was around 20X for four individuals and around 5X for eight individuals. Preliminary analyses suggest that: Marsican genomes have about 2/3 of the number of SNPs observed in the Spanish bears, and 1/3 of the SNPs found in other European bears; Marsican bears are highly homogenous, and their genomes are similarly distant to all the other European individuals; several fixed non- synonymous substitutions are observed in the Marsican bears; long stretches of homozigosity are predominantly found in Marsican bears, suggesting that inbreeding might be an issue in this population; the pattern of population structure in Europe is weaker at the genomic than at the mitochondrial level; the isolation of the Marsican bear is probably older than previously estimated.
Evolutionary biology
Evoluzione
9788879598828
set-2015
Benazzo, A.; Boitani, L.; Cahill, J.; Ciucci, P.; Cornetti, L.; Fumagalli, M.; Fuselli, S.; Ghirotto, S.; Delser, P.M.; Mona, S.; Ometto, L.; Orlando, L.; Panziera, A.; Rota Stabelli, O.; Shapiro, B.; Trucchi, E.; Vernesi, C.; Zanetti, E.; Bertorelle, G. (2015-09). The evolution of the small and isolated population of Apennine brown bears (Ursus arctos Marsicanus): a whole-genomes perspective. In: Evoluzione 2015: 6th Congress of the Italian Society for Evolutionary Biology, Bologna, Italy, 31 agosto-3 settembre 2015. Bologna: Università degli studi di Bologna: 39. ISBN: 9788879598828. handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10449/33251
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