Sheremetyeva I.N., Popova A.A.
В издании Modern Achievements in Population, Evolutionary, and Ecological Genetics: International Symposium, Vladivostok – Vostok Marine Biological Station, September 2–5, 2025: Abstracts
Год: 2025 Страницы: 42
Reptiles currently account for one-third of all terrestrial vertebrate diversity, with at least 21.1% of species threatened with extinction and the status of another 15% unknown. Ectothermy makes reptiles more vulnerable than other terrestrial vertebrates by virtue of their sensitivity to seasonal temperature fluctuations. However, they still remain one of the least studied groups of vertebrates. Two species of the endemic Asian genus Takydromus (grass lizards or oriental racers) inhabit in the Russian Far East: the Amur Grass lizard, Takydromus amurensis Peters 1881, and the Mountain Grass lizard, Takydromus wolteri Fischer 1885. Although these species often appear in phylogenetic research concerning the genus Takydromus (Arnold, 1997; Lin et al., 2002; Ota et al., 2002; Lue, Lin, 2008; Chen et al., 2009; Guo et al., 2024), there are no studies on their intraspecific genetic variability. In our recent work, the use of an unconventional phylogenetic approach allowed us to divide the genus Takydromus members into two ecological groups: forest and meadow, the evolution of which proceeded in parallel (Sheremetyeva, Popova, 2025). To continue the research, we decided to test the hypothesis of the lower genetic diversity and a higher population subdivision in the forest group species compared to the grassland group. The work aimed to assess the mtDNA cytb gene variability in the two Takydromus species living in approximately the same macroecological conditions, but belonging to different ecological groups (Amur Grass Lizard is a forest species, Mountain Grass Lizard is a grassland species). As a result, the first data on the genetic variability of two Far Eastern Takydromus species were obtained. In the Amur Grass Lizard, we identified four phylogenetic lineages with clear geographic confinement. It has been suggested that a refugium for T. amurensis may have existed in the past in the south of Sikhote-Alin (Sheremetyeva et al., 2025). For Mountain Grass Lizard, four phylogenetic lineages were found on the mainland with no clear geographic association and one on Jeju Island. The data obtained indicate a lower nucleotide diversity in Amur Grass Lizard (0.00905±0.0009) compared to Mountain Grass Lizard (0.01423±0.00749), which confirms the proposed hypothesis and is inconsistent with preliminary data on the T. amurensis variability.
