Computed tomography examination and mitochondrial DNA analysis of Japanese wolf skull covered with skin.

Abstract

A Canis skull, right half of the mandible and part of the left half of the mandible were subjected to three-dimensional (3D) computed tomography (CT) observation and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) analysis in order to determine whether the specimens belonged to the extinct Japanese wolf, Canis lupus hodophilax (Temminck, 1839). Osteometric analysis of the skull and right half of the mandible revealed that the material (JW275) was indeed typical of the Japanese wolf. Sequence analysis of a 600-bp mtDNA region revealed that the JW275 belonged to haplotype Group B, which is characterized by an 8-bp deletion in the mtDNA control region. The findings of this study suggest that 3D CT analysis is well suited to examining fragile and valuable biological samples, as it removes the need for destructive sampling.