Who calls the African Wild dog? De novo SNP discovery and genotyping in the Lycaon pictus.

Summary

Short description of your pro: Large carnivores, especially the African wild dog, are vulnerable to human-mediated changes and climate effects. As they are apex predators, they also affect lower trophic levels. Due to anthropogenic land-use changes affecting habitat, prey, and their population densities, their populations are declining. Thus, accurate population demographic estimates are required for conservation efforts to sustain carnivore populations. Genetic data are of high importance when analysing population demographics as they allow the study of oftentimes cryptic effects (loss of genetic diversity, inbreeding depression, and genetic drift). As next-generation sequencing techniques advances, genetic markers as single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) can provide key ecological information. This information can be used to implement conservation efforts to impede the negative effects on wild dog populations. The main purpose of this study was to develop a highly informative SNP panel through de novo SNP discovery and genotyping of the non-modelled African wild dog. A total of 74 SNP markers were validated and 83 individuals were identified. The SNP chip provides a foundation for further research on relatedness, parental linkage, dispersal patterns, population size estimates, and discovery of cryptic effects.