Conservation of frogs is of global concern, owing to declines resulting from habitat destruction, global climate change, and disease. Knowledge of genetic variation in frog species is therefore desirable for the identification of management units. Here we surveyed mitochondrial DNA sequence variation in the Tasmanian endemic hylid frog Litoria burrowsae, which is infected by chytrid fungus, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, and may be declining. Neither phylogeographic structure nor deep phylogenetic divergence was detected in the species, although its populations were highly differentiated with respect to haplotype frequencies. The low-haplotype diversity in L. burrowsae suggests a recent bottleneck in the species, and population genetic structuring may reflect isolation by distance as well as founder effects associated with range expansion. Three putative management units were identified that require verification based on nuclear DNA variation and adaptation to local environments.

Item Type:	Refereed Article
Keywords:	conservation genetics, genetic diversity, phylogeography
Research Division:	Biological Sciences
Research Group:	Evolutionary Biology
Research Field:	Biogeography and Phylogeography
Objective Division:	Expanding Knowledge
Objective Group:	Expanding Knowledge
Objective Field:	Expanding Knowledge in the Environmental Sciences
UTAS Author:	Zhang, ZY (Mr Ze Yang Zhang)
UTAS Author:	Burridge, CP (Associate Professor Christopher Burridge)
ID Code:	98120
Year Published:	2014
Web of Science® Times Cited:	1
Deposited By:	Zoology
Deposited On:	2015-02-02
Last Modified:	2017-10-31
Downloads:	0