Phylogenomic insights into the diversity and evolution of Palearctic vipers.

Despite decades of molecular research, phylogenetic relationships in Palearctic vipers (genus Vipera) still essentially rely on a few loci, such as mitochondrial barcoding genes. Here we examined the diversity and evolution of Vipera with ddRAD-seq data from 33 representative species and subspecies. Phylogenomic analyses of âˆ¼ 1.1 Mb recovered nine major clades corresponding to known species/species complexes which are generally consistent with the mitochondrial phylogeny, albeit with a few deep discrepancies that highlight past hybridization events. The most spectacular case is the Italian-endemic V. walser, which is grouped with the alpine genetic diversity of V. berus in the nuclear tree despite carrying a divergent mitogenome related to the Caucasian V. kaznakovi complex. Clustering analyses of SNPs suggest potential admixture between diverged Iberian taxa (V. aspis zinnikeri and V. seoanei), and confirm that the Anatolian V. pontica corresponds to occasional hybrids between V. (ammodytes) meridionalis and V. kaznakovi. Finally, all analyzed lineages of the V. berus complex (including V. walser and V. barani) form vast areas of admixture and may be delimited as subspecies. Our study sets grounds for future taxonomic and phylogeographic surveys on Palearctic vipers, a group of prime interest for toxinological, ecological, biogeographic and conservation research.

Diversifying selection and color-biased dispersal in the asp viper.

BACKGROUND: The presence of intraspecific color polymorphism can have multiple impacts on the ecology of a species; as a consequence, particular color morphs may be strongly selected for in a given habitat type. For example, the asp viper (Vipera aspis) shows a high level of color polymorphism. A blotched morph (cryptic) is common throughout its range (central and western Europe), while a melanistic morph is frequently found in montane populations, presumably for thermoregulatory reasons. Besides, rare atypical uniformly colored individuals are known here and there. Nevertheless, we found in a restricted treeless area of the French Alps, a population containing a high proportion (>50%) of such specimens. The aim of the study is to bring insight into the presence and function of this color morph by (i) studying the genetic structure of these populations using nine microsatellite markers, and testing for (ii) a potential local diversifying selection and (iii) differences in dispersal capacity between blotched and non-blotched vipers. RESULTS: Our genetic analyses support the occurrence of local diversifying selection for the non-blotched phenotype. In addition, we found significant color-biased dispersal, blotched individuals dispersing more than atypical individuals. CONCLUSION: We hypothesize that, in this population, the non-blotched phenotype possess an advantage over the typical one, a phenomenon possibly due to a better background matching ability in a more open habitat. In addition, color-biased dispersal might be partly associated with the observed local diversifying selection, as it can affect the genetic structure of populations, and hence the distribution of color morphs.

The Silk roads: phylogeography of Central Asian dice snakes (Serpentes: Natricidae) shaped by rivers in deserts and mountain valleys.

Influenced by rapid changes in climate and landscape features since the Miocene, widely distributed species provide suitable models to study the environmental impact on their evolution and current genetic diversity. The dice snake Natrix tessellata, widely distributed in the Western Palearctic is one such species. We aimed to resolve a detailed phylogeography of N. tessellata with a focus on the Central Asian clade with 4 and the Anatolia clade with 3 mitochondrial lineages, trace their origin, and correlate the environmental changes that affected their distribution through time. The expected time of divergence of both clades began at 3.7 Mya in the Pliocene, reaching lineage differentiation approximately 1 million years later. The genetic diversity in both clades is rich, suggesting different ancestral areas, glacial refugia, demographic changes, and colonization routes. The Caspian lineage is the most widespread lineage in Central Asia, distributed around the Caspian Sea and reaching the foothills of the Hindu Kush Mountains in Afghanistan, and Eastern European lowlands in the west. Its distribution is limited by deserts, mountains, and cold steppe environments. Similarly, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan lineages followed the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya water systems in Central Asia, with ranges delimited by the large Kyzylkum and Karakum deserts. On the western side, there are several lineages within the Anatolia clade that converged in the central part of the peninsula with 2 being endemic to Western Asia. The distribution of both main clades was affected by expansion from their Pleistocene glacial refugia around the Caspian Sea and in the valleys of Central Asia as well as by environmental changes, mostly through aridification.

A new rainfrog of the genus Pristimantis (Anura, Brachycephaloidea) from central and eastern Panama.

Substantial molecular and morphological character differences lead us to the description of a new species of the genus Pristimantis from the cloud forest of Cerro Chucantí, Maje Mountains, Darien Province, as well as from several other mountain ranges in eastern and central Panama. Pristimantisgretathunbergae sp. nov. is a sister species to the allopatric P.erythropleura-penelopus group from northern Colombia with a mtDNA sequence divergence of > 4.4% at 16S and > 14.6% at COI. Its closest congener in sympatry is P.cruentus that differs by a large sequence divergence of > 9.6% in 16S mtDNA and 19.0% at COI, and from which it differs also by ventral and groin coloration, unusually prominent black eyes, a contrasting light upper lip, commonly a single conical to spine-like tubercle on the upper eyelid, and a larger head. While the habitat continuity at most sites in eastern Panama is moderate, habitats in central Panama are severely fragmented. Cerro Chucantí and the surrounding Maje Mountains are highly threatened by rapid deforestation and replaced by plantations and cattle pastures. Thus, investigations on the ecology of the new species and its population status, especially at the type locality, are highly recommended. As a flagship species, this new frog can help to preserve the Chucantí cloud forest including several recently described species known only from this isolated area in eastern Panama.

Citizen science and online data: Opportunities and challenges for snake ecology and action against snakebite.

The secretive behavior and life history of snakes makes studying their biology, distribution, and the epidemiology of venomous snakebite challenging. One of the most useful, most versatile, and easiest to collect types of biological data are photographs, particularly those that are connected with geographic location and date-time metadata. Photos verify occurrence records, provide data on phenotypes and ecology, and are often used to illustrate new species descriptions, field guides and identification keys, as well as in training humans and computer vision algorithms to identify snakes. We scoured eleven online and two offline sources of snake photos in an attempt to collect as many photos of as many snake species as possible, and attempt to explain some of the inter-species variation in photograph quantity among global regions and taxonomic groups, and with regard to medical importance, human population density, and range size. We collected a total of 725,565 photos-between 1 and 48,696 photos of 3098 of the world's 3879 snake species (79.9%), leaving 781 "most wanted" species with no photos (20.1% of all currently-described species as of the December 2020 release of The Reptile Database). We provide a list of most wanted species sortable by family, continent, authority, and medical importance, and encourage snake photographers worldwide to submit photos and associated metadata, particularly of "missing" species, to the most permanent and useful online archives: The Reptile Database, iNaturalist, and HerpMapper.

A new subspecies of Zamenis hohenackeri (Strauch, 1873) (Serpentes: Colubridae) based on morphological and molecular data.

Based on morphological characteristics, two subspecies of the Transcaucasian rat snake (Zamenis hohenackeri) are currently recognized, namely Z. h. tauricus and Z. h. hohenackeri. Both subspecies are repeatedly considered to be conspecific colour morphs, or have even been confused with Z. situla. Although, few studies involved the Transcaucasian rat snake in a phylogenetic approach, none has so far led to any taxonomic changes. We assessed the intraspecific morphological variation and phylogeographic relationships among specimens from different locations across its updated distribution. Our molecular (1191 bp mtDNA, 565 bp nuDNA) and morphological data provide sufficient evidence to support three distinct lineages within the Z. hohenackeri complex with a different arrangement compared to a previous study. These represent the subspecies Z. h. hohenackeri, Z. h. tauricus, and a lineage from southwestern Turkey which is described as a new subspecies. Aspects of historical biogeography and conservation status are briefly discussed.

Systematics of South American snail-eating snakes (Serpentes, Dipsadini), with the description of five new species from Ecuador and Peru.

A molecular phylogeny of the Neotropical snail-eating snakes (tribe Dipsadini) is presented including 43 (24 for the first time) of the 77 species, sampled for both nuclear and mitochondrial genes. Morphological and phylogenetic support was found for four new species of Dipsas and one of Sibon, which are described here based on their unique combination of molecular, meristic, and color pattern characteristics. Sibynomorphus is designated as a junior subjective synonym of Dipsas. Dipsas latifrontalis and D. palmeri are resurrected from the synonymy of D. peruana. Dipsas latifasciata is transferred from the synonymy of D. peruana to the synonymy of D. palmeri. A new name, D. jamespetersi, is erected for the taxon currently known as Sibynomorphus petersi. Re-descriptions of D. latifrontalis and D. peruana are presented, as well as the first photographic voucher of an adult specimen of D. latifrontalis, along with photographs of all known Ecuadorian Dipsadini species. The first country record of D. variegata in Ecuador is provided and D. oligozonata removed from the list of Peruvian herpetofauna. With these changes, the number of Dipsadini reported in Ecuador increases to 22, 18 species of Dipsas and four of Sibon.

Molecular phylogeny of Atractus (Serpentes, Dipsadidae), with emphasis on Ecuadorian species and the description of three new taxa.

We present a molecular phylogeny of snake genus Atractus, with an improved taxon sampling that includes 30 of the 140 species currently recognized. The phylogenetic tree supports the existence of at least three new species in the Pacific lowlands and adjacent Andean slopes of the Ecuadorian Andes, which we describe here. A unique combination of molecular, meristic and color pattern characters support the validity of the new species. With the newly acquired data, we propose and define the Atractus iridescens species group, as well as redefine the Atractus roulei species group. The species Atractus iridescens is reported for the first time in Ecuador, whereas Atractus bocourti and Atractus medusa are removed from the herpetofauna of this country. We provide the first photographic vouchers of live specimens for Atractus multicinctus, Atractus paucidens and Atractus touzeti, along with photographs of 19 other Ecuadorian Atractus species. The current status of Atractus occidentalis and Atractus paucidens is maintained based on the discovery of new material referable to these species. With these changes, the species number reported in Ecuador increases to 27, a number that is likely to increase as material not examined in this work becomes available and included in systematic studies.

Composition and natural history notes of the coastal snake assemblage from Northern Bahia, Brazil.

Information about the snake diversity and their natural history from the Atlantic forest domain in Brazil refer mostly to inland forests than to coastal region. Within the state of Bahia, this knowledge is concentrated to the southeastern coastal stretch. Herein we report on the diversity of snakes from the restinga, ombrophilous forest and anthropogenic environment from the northern Atlantic coast of Bahia. We sampled nine sites for three years and visited four museum collections. Furthermore, we provide anecdotal natural history information, voucher analyses, literature complements, and a key to fascilitate species identification. We report a total of 774 snakes belonging to 50 species and 23 new distribution records for northeastern coast of Bahia, supplemented by new data on feeding and reproduction. The number of detected species is similar to numbers obtained in comparable studies from other Brazilian ecoregions. This study reports and focuses for the first time on all known species of snakes from the northeastern coast of Bahia.

Citizen science and online data: opportunities and challenges for snake ecology and action against snakebite

The secretive behavior and life history of snakes makes studying their biology, distribution, and the epidemiology of venomous snakebite challenging. One of the most useful, most versatile, and easiest to collect types of biological data are photographs, particularly those that are connected with geographic location and date-time metadata. Photos verify occurrence records, provide data on phenotypes and ecology, and are often used to illustrate new species descriptions, field guides and identification keys, as well as in training humans and computer vision algorithms to identify snakes. We scoured eleven online and two offline sources of snake photos in an attempt to collect as many photos of as many snake species as possible, and attempt to explain some of the inter-species variation in photograph quantity among global regions and taxonomic groups, and with regard to medical importance, human population density, and range size. We collected a total of 725,565 photos—between 1 and 48,696 photos of 3098 of the world's 3879 snake species (79.9%), leaving 781 “most wanted” species with no photos (20.1% of all currently-described species as of the December 2020 release of The Reptile Database). We provide a list of most wanted species sortable by family, continent, authority, and medical importance, and encourage snake photographers worldwide to submit photos and associated metadata, particularly of “missing” species, to the most permanent and useful online archives: The Reptile Database, iNaturalist, and HerpMapper.

Insulin regulates protein kinase CbetaII alternative splicing in multiple target tissues: development of a hormonally responsive heterologous minigene.

Cells respond to external signals like insulin to alter metabolic pathways in response to varying physiological environments. Insulin stimulates the protein kinase C beta (PKCbeta) isozymes and preferentially switches the expression to PKCbetaII isozyme, which is shown to have a crucial role in glucose uptake, cellular proliferation, and differentiation. We have developed an insulin-responsive PKCbetaII heterologous minigene to identify cis-elements in vivo in eukaryotes by cloning the PKCbetaII exon and its flanking intronic sequences into the splicing vector pSPL3. The transfected minigene mimicked the endogenous insulin response of PKCbetaII alternative splicing in five distinct cell types, i.e. L6 skeletal muscle, 3T3-L1 pre-adipocytes, HepG2 human hepatoma cells, A10 vascular smooth muscle cells, and murine embryonic fibroblasts within 30 min of insulin stimulation. Sequential deletions of the flanking introns in the minigene demonstrated that insulin regulated elements within the 5'-intron flanking the PKCbetaII exon. Mutational studies indicated the SRp40 binding site promotes splice site selection. In these cases, splicing appears to be regulated by a phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase signaling pathway because LY294002 and wortmannin, its specific inhibitors, blocked exon inclusion. Cotransfection with constitutively active Akt2 kinase mimicked insulin action. Signal-dependent regulation of splicing by insulin is unique from tissue-specific and developmentally regulated mechanisms previously reported and serves as a prototype for studies of alternative splicing involving protein phosphorylation.

A new species of Dactyloa from eastern Panama, with comments on other Dactyloa species present in the region.

Giant anoles of the genus Dactyloa have been considered to be represented in eastern Panama by six species. In this contribution, we describe a seventh species that is restricted to the Majé, San Blas, Darién, and Piedras-Pacora mountain ranges. The new species resembles D. ibanezi, D. limon, and D. purpurescens in external morphology but differs from these species in dewlap coloration, dorsal color pattern, morphometrics, and scalation. The recognition of the new species is further supported by DNA barcoding (genetic distances >2.7% in 16S and >7.8% in COI between the new species and all other species of Dactyloa). We discuss the taxonomic identity of D. purpurescens, and, based on morphological evidence, we place D. chocorum in the synonymy of the former species. An identification key for all 11 Dactyloa species occurring in Panama is provided.

Revision of the genus Lepidoblepharis (Reptilia: Squamata: Sphaerodactylidae) in Central America, with the description of three new species.

Based on morphological and molecular data, we describe three new species of the genus Lepidoblepharis with granular dorsals from Panama (Lepidoblepharis emberawoundule sp. nov., Lepidoblepharis rufigularis sp. nov., and Lepidoblepharis victormartinezi sp. nov.). The results of our molecular analyses confirm the existence of five deeply differentiated genealogical lineages among Panamanian Lepidoblepharis. We present detailed descriptions of their morphology, including some new valuable scalation characters (ventral and subfemoral escutcheon) and hemipenes, as well as comparisons with the other two species of the genus known to occur in Panama (L. sanctaemartae and L. xanthostigma) and their South American congeners. Last, we provide an updated identification key for the genus Lepidoblepharis in Central America.

Two new fringe-limbed frogs of the genus Ecnomiohyla (Anura: Hylidae) from Panama.

Forest canopy-dwelling frogs are usually among the rarest anuran species observed in the neotropical forest, mainly because they fall outside of the scope of the standard search methods used by herpetologists. During field explorations undertaken in western and eastern Panama in recent years, we discovered two species belonging to the genus Ecnomiohyla, which showed significant differences in genetic distances (16S mtDNA gene) and morphological characteristics different from any known Ecnomiohyla species. The first specimen originates from the Serranía de Jingurudó, Darién province, southeastern Panamá, and is described herein as E. bailarina sp. nov., and the second specimen was found at Santa Fe National Park, Veraguas province, central-western Panama, and is described as E. veraguensis sp. nov. We provide a detailed description of both new species, including comparisons of morphological and molecular characters of almost all members of the genus in lower Central America, as well as an identification key for the entire genus.

Phosphoinositide 3-kinase mediates protein kinase C beta II mRNA destabilization in rat A10 smooth muscle cell cultures exposed to high glucose.

High-glucose exposure down-regulates protein kinaseC beta II posttranscriptionally in rat and human vascular smooth muscle cells and contributes to increased cell proliferation. High-glucose-induced mRNA destabilization is specific for PKC beta II mRNA, while PKC beta I and other PKC mRNA are not affected. This study focused on whether glucose metabolism was required. The effect was blocked by cytochalasin B, suggesting a requirement for glucose uptake. Glucosamine did not mimic the effect, indicating that metabolism via hexosamine pathway was not involved. The effect was hexokinase-independent since 3-O-methylglucose, in a dose-dependent manner, mimicked high-glucose effects. Cycloheximide did not block the effect excluding dependency on new protein synthesis. Wortmannin and LY294002, phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3-kinase) inhibitors, blocked glucose effects in the presence of 5,6-dichloro-1-beta-d-ribofuranosylbenzimidazole. Glucose and 3-O-methylglucose activated PI3-kinase, and LY294002 blocked glucose effects on Akt phosphorylation. In these cells, high-glucose concentrations activated a metabolically linked signaling pathway independent of glucose metabolism to regulate mRNA processing.

The protein kinase C beta II exon confers mRNA instability in the presence of high glucose concentrations.

Previous studies showed that short term exposure of cells to high glucose destabilized protein kinase C (PKC) betaII mRNA, whereas PKCbetaI mRNA levels remained unaltered. Because PKCbeta mRNAs share common sequences other than the PKCbetaII exon encoding a different carboxyl terminus, we examined PKCbetaII mRNA for a cis-acting region that could confer glucose-induced destabilization. A beta-globin/growth hormone reporter con struct containing the PKCbetaII exon was transfected into human aorta and rat vascular smooth muscle cells (A10) to follow glucose-induced destabilization. Glucose (25 mm) exposure destabilized PKCbetaII chimeric mRNA but not control mRNA. Deletion analysis and electrophoretic mobility shift assays followed by UV cross-linking experiments demonstrated that a region introduced by inclusion of the betaII exon was required to confer destabilization. Although a cis-acting element mapped to 38 nucleotides within the betaII exon was necessary to bestow destabilization, it was not sufficient by itself to confer complete mRNA destabilization. Yet, in intact cells antisense oligonucleotides complementary to this region blocked glucose-induced destabilization. These results suggest that this region must function in context with other sequence elements created by exon inclusion involved in affecting mRNA stability. In summary, inclusion of an exon that encodes PKCbetaII mRNA introduces a cis-acting region that confers destabilization to the mRNA in response to glucose.