A Phylogenetic Study of Korean Rodents (Muridae, Sciuridae) Based on Mitochondrial and Nuclear DNA

Abstract

The subfamily Murinae is a very controversial group concerning their phylogenetic relationship. Previous studies could not resolve phylogeny among four genera Apodemus, Micromys, Mus and Rattus of the Muridae. In the present study, eight rodent species resident in South Korea were collected and phylogenetically analyzed based on sequence data of five mitochondrial and nuclear DNA regions: 12S rRNA, cytochrome b gene (cyt b), cytochrome oxidase II (COII), control region of mitochondrial DNA, and a thyroglobulin (Tg) of nuclear DNA. According to the phylogeny of the concatenated data, M. musculus separated early in Murinae (ML 100%; BA 1.00 pp) and the genus Rattus grouped with the harvest mouse, M. minutes; these were separated from the genus Apodemus with relatively strong support (ML 74%; BA 0.76 pp). The Siberian chipmunk population was also examined using the five genes to obtain better resolution. The phylogeny for Korean rodents determined using the 12S rRNA, cyt b, COII and control regions discriminated the Siberian chipmunk populations from Korea, Russia, and China.

Historical Review and Notes on Small Mammals (Mammalia: Erinaceomorpha, Soricomorpha, Rodentia) in Korea

“…Several species of Rodentia and Soricomorpha from Korea and neighboring countries were reexamined from the results of analyses using rRNA and mtDNA sequences by Koh et al (2000Koh et al ( , 2008aKoh et al ( , 2008bKoh et al ( , 2009bKoh et al ( , 2010Koh et al ( , 2012aKoh et al ( , 2012bKoh et al ( , 2013. Phylogenetic relationships of Korean Rodentia was performed by Jung et al (2010), based on mtDNA and nuclear DNA. Additionally, taxonomic positions of several Soricidae in Korea were studied by several researchers: Ohdachi et al (2003, 2004, 2005, 2012), Tatsuo et al (2005), and Kartavtseva and Park (2010).…”