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Historical ecology meets conservation and evolutionary genetics: a secondary contact zone between Carabus violaceus (Coleoptera, Carabidae) populations inhabiting ancient and recent woodlands in north-western Germany

Abstract. Only very few cases have documented that an increase in connectivity after a period of fragmentation in ecological time has had an effect on the distribution, genetic structure and morphology of stenotopic species. In this study we present an example of clinal variability in a woodland gro...

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Autores principales: Matern, Andrea, Drees, Claudia, Härdtle, Werner, von Oheimb, Goddert, Assmann, Thorsten
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Pensoft Publishers 2011
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3131037/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21738433
http://dx.doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.100.1546
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author Matern, Andrea
Drees, Claudia
Härdtle, Werner
von Oheimb, Goddert
Assmann, Thorsten
author_facet Matern, Andrea
Drees, Claudia
Härdtle, Werner
von Oheimb, Goddert
Assmann, Thorsten
author_sort Matern, Andrea
collection PubMed
description Abstract. Only very few cases have documented that an increase in connectivity after a period of fragmentation in ecological time has had an effect on the distribution, genetic structure and morphology of stenotopic species. In this study we present an example of clinal variability in a woodland ground beetle as a result of changes in the connectivity of a landscape during the last two centuries. The study area hosts both the nominate form Carabus violaceus s. str. and the subspecies Carabus violaceus purpurascens, which is ranked as a distinct species by some authors. We studied 12 Carabus violaceus populations from a 30 km transect of ancient and recent forests in north-western Germany. We analyzed three polymorphic enzyme loci, classified the elytron sculpture and measured the shape of the aedeagus tip of the specimens. Carabus violaceus showed secondary gradients both in allozyme markers and morphometric characters in our study area. A genetic differentiation of 16% between the populations is high but lies within the range of intraspecific variability in habitat specialists of the genus Carabus. Populations had no significant deficit of heterozygotes. We found many hybrid populations in terms of morphological properties. This study highlights the conservation value of ancient woodland and the consequences of landscape connectivity and defragmentation on the genetic setting of a ground beetle. Moreover, it shows that differences in the external shape of male genitalia do not prevent gene flow within the genus Carabus. Thus, the establishment of species status should not exclusively be based on this property.
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spelling pubmed-31310372011-07-07 Historical ecology meets conservation and evolutionary genetics: a secondary contact zone between Carabus violaceus (Coleoptera, Carabidae) populations inhabiting ancient and recent woodlands in north-western Germany Matern, Andrea Drees, Claudia Härdtle, Werner von Oheimb, Goddert Assmann, Thorsten Zookeys Article Abstract. Only very few cases have documented that an increase in connectivity after a period of fragmentation in ecological time has had an effect on the distribution, genetic structure and morphology of stenotopic species. In this study we present an example of clinal variability in a woodland ground beetle as a result of changes in the connectivity of a landscape during the last two centuries. The study area hosts both the nominate form Carabus violaceus s. str. and the subspecies Carabus violaceus purpurascens, which is ranked as a distinct species by some authors. We studied 12 Carabus violaceus populations from a 30 km transect of ancient and recent forests in north-western Germany. We analyzed three polymorphic enzyme loci, classified the elytron sculpture and measured the shape of the aedeagus tip of the specimens. Carabus violaceus showed secondary gradients both in allozyme markers and morphometric characters in our study area. A genetic differentiation of 16% between the populations is high but lies within the range of intraspecific variability in habitat specialists of the genus Carabus. Populations had no significant deficit of heterozygotes. We found many hybrid populations in terms of morphological properties. This study highlights the conservation value of ancient woodland and the consequences of landscape connectivity and defragmentation on the genetic setting of a ground beetle. Moreover, it shows that differences in the external shape of male genitalia do not prevent gene flow within the genus Carabus. Thus, the establishment of species status should not exclusively be based on this property. Pensoft Publishers 2011-05-20 /pmc/articles/PMC3131037/ /pubmed/21738433 http://dx.doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.100.1546 Text en Andrea Matern, Claudia Drees, Werner Härdtle, Goddert von Oheimb, Thorsten Assmann http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0 This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Article
Matern, Andrea
Drees, Claudia
Härdtle, Werner
von Oheimb, Goddert
Assmann, Thorsten
Historical ecology meets conservation and evolutionary genetics: a secondary contact zone between Carabus violaceus (Coleoptera, Carabidae) populations inhabiting ancient and recent woodlands in north-western Germany
title Historical ecology meets conservation and evolutionary genetics: a secondary contact zone between Carabus violaceus (Coleoptera, Carabidae) populations inhabiting ancient and recent woodlands in north-western Germany
title_full Historical ecology meets conservation and evolutionary genetics: a secondary contact zone between Carabus violaceus (Coleoptera, Carabidae) populations inhabiting ancient and recent woodlands in north-western Germany
title_fullStr Historical ecology meets conservation and evolutionary genetics: a secondary contact zone between Carabus violaceus (Coleoptera, Carabidae) populations inhabiting ancient and recent woodlands in north-western Germany
title_full_unstemmed Historical ecology meets conservation and evolutionary genetics: a secondary contact zone between Carabus violaceus (Coleoptera, Carabidae) populations inhabiting ancient and recent woodlands in north-western Germany
title_short Historical ecology meets conservation and evolutionary genetics: a secondary contact zone between Carabus violaceus (Coleoptera, Carabidae) populations inhabiting ancient and recent woodlands in north-western Germany
title_sort historical ecology meets conservation and evolutionary genetics: a secondary contact zone between carabus violaceus (coleoptera, carabidae) populations inhabiting ancient and recent woodlands in north-western germany
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3131037/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21738433
http://dx.doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.100.1546
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