We sequenced leopard genomes from all over their distribution, and found a striking genomic distinction between African and Asian leopards! Check out the results, published in Current Biology:
Paijmans JLA, Barlow A, Becker MS, Cahill JA, Fickel J, Förster DWG, Gries K, Hartmann S, Havmøller RW, Henneberger K, Kern C, Kitchener AC, Lorenzen ED, Mayer F, OBrien SJ, Seth J von, Sinding M-HS, Spong G, Uphyrkina O, Wachter B, Westbury MV, Dalén L, Bhak J, Manica A, Hofreiter M (2021) African and Asian leopards are highly differentiated at the genomic level. Current Biology (in press): . https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2021.03.084
Associated article in The Conversation:
“We studied the DNA of African and Asian leopards and found big differences between the two”. https://theconversation.com/we-studied-the-dna-of-african-and-asian-leopards-and-found-big-differences-between-the-two-158721
