Phylogeny, genetic diversity and population structure of Brandt`s hedgehog Paraechinus hypomelas, inferred from the mitochondrial evidences

The Brandt`s hedgehog Paraechinus hypomelas (Brandt 1836), is a relatively widespread species which range from Arabian Peninsula and Iran, through southern areas of Central Asia to western South Asia.The phylogenetic position of the species tat is little known in Iran, although it has been studied in different parts of its distributional range. To this aim, during 2017-2018, the species was sampled in a non-invasive method (n= 34) from the southeast of Iran. Genetic variation and polymorphic sites were determined from cytb (1120bp). Totally 22 haplotypes and haplotype diversity ranging from 0.859 to 1.099 were detected from cytb. The average value of the nucleotide differences among the cytb sequences was calculated as 4.68. The Tamija’s  D test (-1.88) and Fu`s FS test (-15.73) revealed negative value, indicating significantly deviations from neutrality which both indicate of recent population expansion. Investigation on pairwise differences, mismatch distributions, indicated of past expansions (SSD= 0.0033, P value = 0.38). The Iran south east population constitute a phylogenetic clade which is completely distinct from other known lineages in the species distributional range. Relatively high amount of the haplotype and nucleotide diversity can be related to the high effective population of the species, the rate of gene flow among the populations and also the sudden expansion in the past.