Centre for Ecological Sciences, India Institute of Science, Bangalore, India.
PLoS One. 2013 May 16;8(5):e60615. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0060615. Print 2013.
BACKGROUND OF THE WORK: The phylogenetic position and evolution of Hemidactylus anamallensis (family Gekkonidae) has been much debated in recent times. In the past it has been variously assigned to genus Hoplodactylus (Diplodactylidae) as well as a monotypic genus 'Dravidogecko' (Gekkonidae). Since 1995, this species has been assigned to Hemidactylus, but there is much disagreement between authors regarding its phylogenetic position within this genus. In a recent molecular study H. anamallensis was sister to Hemidactylus but appeared distinct from it in both mitochondrial and nuclear markers. However, this study did not include genera closely allied to Hemidactylus, thus a robust evaluation of this hypothesis was not undertaken.
The objective of this study was to investigate the phylogenetic position of H. anamallensis within the gekkonid radiation. To this end, several nuclear and mitochondrial markers were sequenced from H. anamallensis, selected members of the Hemidactylus radiation and genera closely allied to Hemidactylus. These sequences in conjunction with published sequences were subjected to multiple phylogenetic analyses. Furthermore the nuclear dataset was also subjected to molecular dating analysis to ascertain the divergence between H. anamallensis and related genera.
Results showed that H. anamallensis lineage was indeed sister to Hemidactylus group but was separated from the rest of the Hemidactylus by a long branch. The divergence estimates supported a scenario wherein H. anamallensis dispersed across a marine barrier to the drifting peninsular Indian plate in the late Cretaceous whereas Hemidactylus arrived on the peninsular India after the Indian plate collided with the Eurasian plate. Based on these molecular evidence and biogeographical scenario we suggest that the genus Dravidogecko should be resurrected.
工作背景：Hemidactylus anamallensis（壁虎科）的系统发育位置和进化在最近受到了广泛讨论。过去，它曾被归入 Diplodactylidae 属的 Hoplodactylus 以及单型属“Dravidogecko”（壁虎科）。自 1995 年以来，该物种一直被归入 Hemidactylus，但在这个属内的系统发育位置上，作者之间存在很大分歧。在最近的一项分子研究中，H. anamallensis 与 Hemidactylus 是姐妹群，但在线粒体和核标记上与 Hemidactylus 明显不同。然而，这项研究并未包括与 Hemidactylus 密切相关的属，因此没有对这一假设进行强有力的评估。
本研究的目的是探讨 H. anamallensis 在壁虎科辐射中的系统发育位置。为此，我们从 H. anamallensis、Hemidactylus 辐射中的选定成员以及与 Hemidactylus 密切相关的属中测序了几个核和线粒体标记。将这些序列与已发表的序列一起进行了多次系统发育分析。此外，还对核数据集进行了分子定年分析，以确定 H. anamallensis 与相关属之间的分歧。
结果表明，H. anamallensis 谱系确实与 Hemidactylus 群是姐妹群，但与其余的 Hemidactylus 被一个长分支隔开。分歧估计支持这样一种情景，即在白垩纪晚期，H. anamallensis 通过一个海洋屏障散布到漂移的印度半岛上，而 Hemidactylus 在印度板块与欧亚板块碰撞后才到达印度半岛。基于这些分子证据和生物地理情景，我们建议重新建立 Dravidogecko 属。
