Unraveling the genetic history of the European wild goats

Abstract

The population history of the Iberian wild goat and the Alpine ibex has been closely related to that of humans since the Palaeolithic. Current molecular and paleontological studies differ substantially on the phylogenetic origin of the European wild goats, possibly due the loss of genetic variation through time. We investigated the phylogenetic relationship between the Alpine ibex (Capra ibex) and the Iberianwild goat (Capra pyrenaica) including different Iberian wild goat subspecies by applying ancient DNAtechniques combined with Next Generation Sequencing technologies. We analysed the cytochrome bgene of the mitochondrial genome in 33 ancient and modern European wild goats from Spain and France together with publicly available genetic information of modern wild goats. This work uncovers for thefirst time ancient genetic information of the Iberian wild goat and the Alpine ibex, spanning a time rangeof approximately 40,000 years to the present. Our results suggest genetic continuity between ancientand modern populations and indicate a monophyletic origin of the Alpine ibex and the Iberian wild goatwhen compared to other Capra species. The monophyly of both species is in agreement with other molecular studies based only on modern populations, therefore supporting one-wave migration of wildgoats into Western Europe followed by possible allopatric speciation. We observe three major clades ofwild goats in Western Europe: Capra ibex, Capra pyrenaica pyrenaica and the group containing thesubspecies Capra pyrenaica hispanica and Capra pyrenaica victoriae. This genetic structure recognizes thedistinctiveness of the bucardo (C. p. pyrenaica) from the rest of Iberian wild goats and thus supports theidea that this group is an Evolutionary Significant Unit. The divergence time estimated here indicates analmost contemporaneous split between the three clades around 50,000e90,000 years BP.