Ghawar Wissem, Chaouch Melek, Ben Abderrazak Souha, Snoussi Mohammed Ali, Salem Sadok, Chouchen Said, Bouaoun Amor, Ben Salah Afif, Bettaieb Jihene
Department of Medical Epidemiology, Institut Pasteur de Tunis, Tunis 1002, Tunisia.
Laboratory of Transmission, Control and Immunobiology of Infections (LR16IPT02), Institut Pasteur de Tunis, Tunis 1002, Tunisia.
Animals (Basel). 2022 Mar 17;12(6):758. doi: 10.3390/ani12060758.
The taxonomy of the Lesser Egyptian jerboa, (.) (Dipodinae subfamily), was recently reevaluated, and the taxonomic status was defined by the presence of two cryptic species, . (Linnaeus 1758) and . (Lichtenstein, 1823), with a higher genetic divergence in the sympatric North African populations than in other studied parapatric populations. Using phylogenetic analysis of the cytochrome b () gene from 46 specimens, we confirmed the new status in Tunisia; rodents were collected from two different biotopes belonging to the same locality at the ecological level (mountainous vs. Saharan) in the south of the country. The study of the eye lens weight of these specimens allowed the definition of a cutoff value (58.5 g), categorizing juveniles from adults. Moreover, this study confirmed the phylotaxonomic status of . in Tunisia, as recently illustrated, into two distinct species, . and . , and recorded for the first time the presence of two phylogroups among each of these rodent species. The lack of clear micro-geographical structure and biotope specificity between the two rodent species and their phylogroups was also highlighted.
埃及小跳鼠（ Dipodinae亚科）的分类法最近得到了重新评估，其分类地位由两个隐存种的存在来定义，即（ Linnaeus 1758）和（ Lichtenstein，1823），在同域分布的北非种群中，其遗传差异高于其他研究过的邻域分布种群。通过对46个样本的细胞色素b（ ）基因进行系统发育分析，我们在突尼斯证实了这一新的分类地位；这些啮齿动物是从该国南部同一地点的两个不同生态位（山区与撒哈拉地区）的不同生物群落中收集的。对这些样本的晶状体重量进行研究后确定了一个临界值（58.5克），用于区分幼年个体和成年个体。此外，本研究证实了突尼斯的分类系统地位，正如最近所表明的，分为两个不同的物种， 和 ，并首次记录了这些啮齿动物物种各自存在两个系统发育类群。还强调了这两种啮齿动物物种及其系统发育类群之间缺乏明确的微观地理结构和生物群落特异性。
