Population genomics of Corsican wildcats: Paving the way toward a new subspecies within the Felis silvestris spp. complex? - Archive ouverte HAL Accéder directement au contenu
Article Dans Une Revue Molecular Ecology Année : 2023

Population genomics of Corsican wildcats: Paving the way toward a new subspecies within the Felis silvestris spp. complex?

Elodie Portanier
Hélène Henri
  • Fonction : Auteur
Pierre Benedetti
  • Fonction : Auteur
Frédéric Sanchis
  • Fonction : Auteur
Corinne Régis
  • Fonction : Auteur
Pascale Chevret
Marco Zedda
  • Fonction : Auteur
Adil El Filali
Sandrine Ruette
  • Fonction : Auteur
Sébastien Devillard
  • Fonction : Auteur

Résumé

Abstract In the context of the current extinction crisis, identifying new conservation units is pivotal to the development of sound conservation measures, especially in highly threatened taxa such as felids. Corsican wildcats are known by Corsican people since a very long time but have been little studied. Meaningful information about their phylogenetic position is lacking. We used ddRADseq to genotype phenotypically homogenous Corsican wildcats at 3671 genome‐wide SNPs and reported for the first time their genetic identity. We compared this genomic information to domestic cats Felis silvestris catus from Corsica and mainland France, European wildcats F. s. silvestris and Sardinian wildcats F. s. lybica . Our premise was that if the Corsican wildcat, as a phenotypic entity, also represents a genetic entity, it deserves conservation measures and to be recognized as a conservation unit. Corsican wildcats appeared highly genetically differentiated from European wildcats and genetically closer to Sardinian wildcats than to domestic cats. Domestic cats from Corsica and mainland France were closer to each other and Sardinian wildcats were intermediate between Corsican wildcats and domestic cats. This suggested that Corsican wildcats do not belong to the F. s. silvestris or catus lineages. The inclusion of more high‐quality Sardinian samples and Near‐Eastern mainland F. s. lybica would constitute the next step toward assessing the status of Corsican wildcat as a subspecies and/or evolutionarily significant unit and tracing back wildcat introduction history of in Corsica.
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Dates et versions

hal-04515234 , version 1 (21-03-2024)

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Elodie Portanier, Hélène Henri, Pierre Benedetti, Frédéric Sanchis, Corinne Régis, et al.. Population genomics of Corsican wildcats: Paving the way toward a new subspecies within the Felis silvestris spp. complex?. Molecular Ecology, 2023, 32 (8), pp.1908-1924. ⟨10.1111/mec.16856⟩. ⟨hal-04515234⟩
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