Abstract
Anthropogenic global climate changes are one of the greatest threats to biodiversity. Distribution modeling can predict the effects of climate changes and potentially their effects on genetic diversity. DNA barcoding quickly identifies patterns of genetic diversity. As a case study, we use DNA barcodes and distribution models to predict threats under climate changes in the frog Nanorana parkeri, which is endemic to the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. Barcoding identifies major lineages W and E. Lineage W has a single origin in a refugium and Lineage E derives from three refugia. All refugia locate in river valleys and each greatly contributes to the current level of intraspecific genetic diversity. Species distribution models suggest that global climate changes will greatly influence N. parkeri, especially in the level of genetic diversity, because two former refugia will fail to provide suitable habitat. Our pipeline provides a novel application of DNA barcoding and has important implications for the conservation of biodiversity in southern areas of the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau.
Highlights
Climatic changes influence organisms and an understanding of how this occurs is important for conservation
The fragment consisted of 539 base pairs, of which 35 positions exhibited variation and 27 were potentially parsimony informative, resulting in 23 haplotypes in N. parkeri
DNA barcoding detects the genetic structure of N. parkeri and serves to define evolutionarily significant units (ESUs)
Summary
Climatic changes influence organisms and an understanding of how this occurs is important for conservation. More than one line of evidence documents the impact anthropogenic global climate change (GCC) exerts on organisms [1]. Explorations into how past climate changes influenced organisms may serve to predict future impacts of GCC. Genetic diversity is important in conservation because higher levels maintain the evolutionary potential of species. Environmental changes during glacial-interglacial cycling in the Quaternary is one of the most important historical drivers of genetic patterns [2,3]. By retaining suitable habitat over several glacial cycles, refugia hold higher levels of genetic diversity compared with recently occupied areas [2,3]. A clear understanding a species’ evolutionary history and its drivers is important for planning conservation [4]
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