Chaitanya Ramamoorthi, Dhibar Aranya, Khandekar Akshay, Murthy Channakesava, Meiri Shai, Karanth Praveen
School of Zoology, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel.
Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India.
Mol Ecol. 2025 Jun;34(12):e17800. doi: 10.1111/mec.17800. Epub 2025 May 20.
Marked with high levels of endemism and in situ radiations, the Western Ghats mountains make for a compelling backdrop to examine processes that lead to the formation and maintenance of species. Regional geographic barriers and paleoclimatic fluctuations have been implicated as drivers of speciation, but their roles have not been explicitly tested in a phylogenomic framework. We integrated mitochondrial DNA, genome-wide SNPs and climatic data to examine the influence of geographic barriers and climatic transitions in shaping phylogeography and potential speciation in the Peninsular Indian Flying lizard (Draco dussumieri). We found strong evidence for two independently evolving, geographically distinct, northern and southern lineages within D. dussumieri that diverged during the early Pleistocene, and a gradient of admixed populations across a broad hybrid zone in the Central Western Ghats. Migrations after initial divergence were continuous, but gene flow remained consistently below thresholds required to homogenise lineages. We found more support for isolation by environment (especially rainfall regimes) than by distance. The range-break between lineages occurs at a transition zone in the Central Western Ghats that separates dissimilar rainfall regimes with no physical barriers. This limit is potentially an ecological barrier, which nevertheless was permeable during glacial maxima. We hypothesise that similar phylogeographic patterns will emerge in other widespread, wet-adapted species in the Western Ghats that presumably endured the same climatic processes.
西高止山脉具有高度的特有性和原地辐射现象,为研究导致物种形成和维持的过程提供了引人注目的背景。区域地理障碍和古气候波动被认为是物种形成的驱动因素,但其作用尚未在系统基因组框架中得到明确验证。我们整合了线粒体DNA、全基因组单核苷酸多态性(SNP)和气候数据,以研究地理障碍和气候转变对半岛印度飞蜥(Draco dussumieri)系统地理学和潜在物种形成的影响。我们发现有力证据表明,杜氏飞蜥(Draco dussumieri)内部存在两个独立进化、地理上不同的谱系,即北部谱系和南部谱系,它们在更新世早期就已分化,并且在西高止山脉中部一个广阔的杂交区域内存在混合种群梯度。初始分化后的迁移是持续的,但基因流一直低于使谱系同质化所需的阈值。我们发现,相较于距离隔离,环境隔离(尤其是降雨模式)得到了更多支持。谱系之间的分布间断发生在西高止山脉中部的一个过渡带,该地带分隔了不同的降雨模式,且没有物理障碍。这个界限可能是一个生态障碍,不过在末次盛冰期期间它是可渗透的。我们推测,在西高止山脉其他广泛分布、适应湿润环境的物种中,可能会出现类似的系统地理模式,这些物种大概经历了相同的气候过程。