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The genetic structure of the loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta) in the Mediterranean as revealed by nuclear and mitochondrial DNA and its conservation implications

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Abstract

The population genetic structure of the loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta) nesting in the eastern Mediterranean was assessed by sequencing a fragment of the control region of the mitochondrial DNA (n = 190) and seven microsatellites (n = 112). The two types of markers revealed genetic structuring (mtDNA: γst = 0.212, P < 0.001; nDNA F st = 0.006, P < 0.001), thus indicating that both females and males are philopatric and that gene flow between populations is restricted. Mitochondrial DNA data indicate that the female populations nesting on the islands of Crete and Cyprus have suffered a recent bottleneck or colonization event. However, no bottleneck or founder effect was revealed by nuclear markers, thus indicating male-mediated gene flow from other populations that would increase nuclear genetic variability. Crete, and to a lower extent Cyprus, are thought to play a central role in such male-mediated gene flow that may reduce the negative effect of genetic drift or inbreeding on the small populations of Lebanon and Israel. This population structure indicates that assessing population relevance only on the basis of genetic variability and size would be misleading, as some populations not fulfilling those requirements may play a relevant role in genetic exchange and hence contribute to the overall genetic variability.

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Acknowledgements

The Fundació pel Desenvolupament Sostenible provided logistic support for the fieldwork. This study was funded by the EU project “Protección de Praderas de Posidonia en LICs de Baleares” LIFE00NAT/E/7303, the project BOS2003-05904 of the Spanish Government (CICYT) and the Regional Activity Center for Specially Protected Areas (RAC/SPA) of the Mediterranean Action Plan (United Nations Environment Programme) in Tunis. Samples from Lebanon were collected under the aegis of MEDASSET 2004 sea turtle conservation project. We thank S. Roques for her comments to the manuscript and Daniel Cebrián (RAC/SPA) for his involvement in the project. AFR and DM thank Sonja Baker, Christina Davy and Sandra Muller for sample collection in Greece. We also thank two anonymous referees for their helpful comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Animal Biology, Faculty of Biology, University of Barcelona, Avda. Diagonal 645, E-08028, Barcelona, Spain

    C. Carreras, L. Cardona & A. Aguilar

  2. Estación Biológica de Doñana-CSIC-Apdo., 1056-E-41013, Sevilla, Spain

    C. Carreras

  3. Department of Genetics, Faculty of Biology, University of Barcelona, Avda, Diagonal 645, E-08028, Barcelona, Spain

    M. Pascual

  4. ARCHELON, The Sea Turtle Protection Society of Greece, Solómou 57, GR-104 32, Athens, Greece

    D. Margaritoulis & A. Rees

  5. University of Adnan Menderes, 09010, Aydin, Turkey

    O. Turkozan

  6. The Israel Sea Turtle Rescue Centre, Nature & Parks Authority, Mevoot Yam, Mikhmoret, 40297, Israel

    Y. Levy

  7. Department of Zoology, Faculty of Life Sciences, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv, Israel

    Y. Levy & A. Gasith

  8. Naucrates, Via Corbetta, 11, 22063, Cantù, CO, Italy

    M. Aureggi

  9. MEDASSET, P.O. Box 19, Tyre, Lebanon

    M. Khalil

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  1. C. Carreras
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Correspondence to C. Carreras.

Appendix

Appendix

Table 5 Relative frequencies of alleles, number of chromosomes (N), number of alleles (k), gene diversity (H e) and observed heterozygosity (H o) in each population and for each locus
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Carreras, C., Pascual, M., Cardona, L. et al. The genetic structure of the loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta) in the Mediterranean as revealed by nuclear and mitochondrial DNA and its conservation implications. Conserv Genet 8, 761–775 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10592-006-9224-8

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