Friday 20 April 2012

Tasmanian Tiger Was Genetically Doomed


Even if humans hadn't hunted the Tasmanian tiger to extinction, its low genetic diversity  may have naturally doomed the curious marsupial, researchers have found.

"We found that the thylacine had even less genetic diversity than the Tasmanian devil," study researcher Andrew Pask, of the University of Connecticut, said in a statement. "If they were still be around today, they'd be at a severe risk, just like the devil."

The Tasmanian tiger (Thylacinus cynocephalus), also known as the thylacine, was hunted to extinction in the early 1900s; the last one died in a Tasmanian zoo in 1936. Named for its telltale stripes, the Tasmanian tiger stood as tall as a medium-size dog and once roamed across both mainland Australia and Tasmania.

The new research captured some genetic fragments from the Tasmanian tiger, from 14 samples including pelts, bones and preserved specimens more than 100 years old. The scientists found the individuals to be 99.5 percent similar over a portion of the genome that normally has lots of differences.

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