We present a new assessment of the genetic and morphological variation within Oxymycterus quaestorThomas, 1903, which currently includes the junior synonyms O. judex Thomas, 1909 and O. misionalisSanborn, 1931. We integrate distinct lines of evidence, including variation of mitochondrial (Cytochrome b [Cytb]) and nuclear (intron 7 of beta fibrinogen gene [Fgb]) sequences, and the assessment of skull quantitative traits based on geometric morphometrics, throughout the Atlantic Forest of Southeastern-Southern Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay. Phylogenetic relationships based on Cytb indicate that O. quaestor is structured in four well-supported clades (lineages A–D), one of them (lineage C) including topotypes of a previously associated nominal form (O. judex). However, these Cytb lineages exhibit lower levels of differentiation based on the Fgb locus, and are not recovered in the genealogies of this nuclear marker, representing a case of mitonuclear discordance. The Cytb lineages also broadly overlapped in the morphospace both in skull shape and size, which sustain the current wider concept of O. quaestor as one single young species (0.947 Myr) that is recently expanding, and ultimately branching out, in the Atlantic Forest.
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13 October 2020
Genetic and morphological variation of Oxymycterus (Rodentia: Sigmodontinae) in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest
Willian Thomaz Peçanha,
Fernando Marques Quintela,
Sergio Luiz Althoff,
João Alves Oliveira,
Pablo Rodrigues Gonçalves,
Diego Marques Henriques Jung,
Alexandre Uarth Christoff,
Gislene Lopes Gonçalves,
Thales Renato Ochotorena Freitas
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Journal of Mammalogy
Vol. 101 • No. 6
December 2020
Vol. 101 • No. 6
December 2020
Akodontini
Atlantic forest
campos de altitude
species limits
systematics
taxonomy
