Genome-wide variant analyses reveal new patterns of admixture and population structure in Australian dingoes
- PMID: 37246949
- PMCID: PMC10524503
- DOI: 10.1111/mec.16998
Genome-wide variant analyses reveal new patterns of admixture and population structure in Australian dingoes
- PMID: 37246949
- PMCID: PMC10524503
- DOI: 10.1111/mec.16998
Abstract
Admixture between species is a cause for concern in wildlife management. Canids are particularly vulnerable to interspecific hybridisation, and genetic admixture has shaped their evolutionary history. Microsatellite DNA testing, relying on a small number of genetic markers and geographically restricted reference populations, has identified extensive domestic dog admixture in Australian dingoes and driven conservation management policy. But there exists a concern that geographic variation in dingo genotypes could confound ancestry analyses that use a small number of genetic markers. Here, we apply genome-wide single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genotyping to a set of 402 wild and captive dingoes collected from across Australia and then carry out comparisons to domestic dogs. We then perform ancestry modelling and biogeographic analyses to characterise population structure in dingoes and investigate the extent of admixture between dingoes and dogs in different regions of the continent. We show that there are at least five distinct dingo populations across Australia. We observed limited evidence of dog admixture in wild dingoes. Our work challenges previous reports regarding the occurrence and extent of dog admixture in dingoes, as our ancestry analyses show that previous assessments severely overestimate the degree of domestic dog admixture in dingo populations, particularly in south-eastern Australia. These findings strongly support the use of genome-wide SNP genotyping as a refined method for wildlife managers and policymakers to assess and inform dingo management policy and legislation moving forwards.
Keywords: admixture; conservation; dingo; dog; hybridisation; population structure.
© 2023 The Authors. Molecular Ecology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
Conflict of interest statement
Conflicts of Interest Declaration
EAO is a co-author with the dog10K Consortium on a 2019 review article. KMC is co-chair of the IUCN Species Survival Commission (SSC) Canid Specialist Group’s Dingo Working Group and a scientific advisor to the Australian Dingo Foundation, New Guinea Singing Dog Conservation Society and New Guinea Highland Wild Dog Foundation.
Figures
Figure 1.
Map drawn in QGIS depicting…
Figure 1.
Map drawn in QGIS depicting the sampling distribution of 307 wild dingoes across…
Figure 2.
FastStructure modelling of 543 canids…
Figure 2.
FastStructure modelling of 543 canids and 195,474 genomic SNPs for K=8–10. Samples grouped…
Figure 3.
Average Dingo ancestry q-value with…
Figure 3.
Average Dingo ancestry q-value with 95% confidence intervals calculated from standard error across…
Figure 4.
Principal coordinates analysis (PcoA) based…
Figure 4.
Principal coordinates analysis (PcoA) based on Nei distances for 543 canids based on…
Figure 5.
Map drawn in QGIS of…
Figure 5.
Map drawn in QGIS of the primary dingo population identity of 320 dingo…
Figure 6.
Principal coordinates analysis (PcoA) of…
Figure 6.
Principal coordinates analysis (PcoA) of Nei distances carried out in SambaR of 320…
Figure 7.
F het (inbreeding coefficient) a…
Figure 7.
F het (inbreeding coefficient) a measure of homozygosity calculated in Plink v1.9 from…
Figure 8.
Comparison between estimated proportion of…
Figure 8.
Comparison between estimated proportion of domestic dog ancestry observed in a set of…
Figure 9.
Comparison of the occurrence and…
Figure 9.
Comparison of the occurrence and prevalence of dingo versus dog ancestry across Australia…
References
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- Allen BL, Allen LR, Ballard G, Jackson SM, & Fleming PJS (2017). A roadmap to meaningful dingo conservation. Canid Biology and Conservation, 20(11), 45–56.
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- Allendorf FW, Leary RF, Spruell P, & Wenburg JK (2001). The problems with hybrids: setting conservation guidelines. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 16(11), 613–622. doi: 10.1016/S0169-5347(01)02290-X - DOI
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