Contrasting levels of genetic differentiation among populations of wolverines (Gulo gulo) from north.pdf

Contrasting levels of genetic differentiation among populations of wolverines (Gulo gulo) from northern Canada revealed by nuclear and mitochondrial loci Derrick E. Chappell1, Ronald A. Van Den Bussche1,*, Julia Krizan2 Brent Patterson2 1Department of Zoology, Collection of Vertebrates, and Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK 74078, USA; 2Department of Sustainable Development, Gov- ernment of Nunavut, Iqaluit, Nunavut, Canada XOA OHO; (*Author for correspondence: fax: 405-744-7824; e-mail: ravdb@) Received 19 March 2004; accepted 25 May 2004 Key words: conservation genetics, mtDNA structuring, wolverines Abstract Habitat loss, fragmentation, overharvest, and other anthropogenic factors have resulted in population and distribution declines for North American wolverines (Gulo gulo). Currently, wolverines east of the Hudson Bay are endangered and possibly extinct, whereas the status of wolverines throughout the remaining Holarctic is vulnerable. Three previous studies using nuclear loci have detected little to no significant structuring among wolverines sampled across northern Canada. Based on these results it has been sug- gested that wolverines in northern Canada represent a single, panmictic population. However, as has been shown in numerous studies, in cases of female site fidelity, it is possible to have demographically auton- omous populations even with male-biased gene flow. To better assess the genetic structure of wolverines in northern Canada, we examined nine microsatellite loci and DNA sequence variation from a 200 bp fragment of the mitochondrial (mtDNA) control region for 270 wolverines from nine collecting areas representing three regions of northern Canada. In agreement with previous studies, microsatellite analyses revealed a lack of significant population substructure (FST ? 0.0004). However, analysis of molecular variance, comparisons of pairwise FST values and nested-clade analysis of the mtDNA dat