Abstract

LLAVEN MACIAS, Viridiana et al. Genetic diversity and structure of Artibeus jamaicensis (Chiroptera: Phyllostomidae) in Chiapas, México. Acta Zool. Mex [online]. 2017, vol.33, n.1, pp.55-66. ISSN 2448-8445.

Deforestation causes fragmentation of habitats, which in turn affects the composition, abundance and demography of species, and therefore the population isolation of many species. The impacts of fragmentation will depend on the responsiveness of the species to disturbances in their habitat, and the configuration and structure of landscape. In some populations, habitat fragmentation can cause long-term population isolation by the reduction in population size and the weakening of relations between individuals, even in highly mobile species like bats. In Mexico, A. jamaicensis is the most studied bat; however, few studies focused on the knowledge of the impacts of habitat modification in its diversity and genetic structure. Therefore, the objective of this study was to evaluate the diversity, structure and genetic differentiation, and analyze demographic history of A. jamaicensis in two different habitats, using a 396 bp fragment of the mitochondrial D-loop region. Haplotype network revealed 34 unique haplotypes of 34 individuals analyzed. Haplotype diversity was high (h = 1) for both populations, and nucleotide diversity was relatively low (< 0.03). The analysis of the distribution of pairwise differences between sequences and negative values of statistical tests based on neutrality suggest a process of recent and sudden demographic expansion of A. jamaicensis. A moderate genetic differentiation points to the existence of genetic structure of A. jamaicensis.

Keywords : demographic history; D-loop; genetic diversity; haplotypes; structure.