How do Rattus norvegicus disperse in rural landscapes? Insights from population genomics on livestock farms

How do Rattus norvegicus disperse in rural landscapes? Insights from population genomics on livestock farms | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Research Article How do Rattus norvegicus disperse in rural landscapes? Insights from population genomics on livestock farms Ignacio Martin Videla, Andrés Fernando Sánchez-Restrepo, Esteban Hasson, and 3 more This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-8043840/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract Rattus norvegicus is a global pest in rural landscapes, yet little is known about its dispersal in these environments. We addressed this issue using RAD-seq markers for 93 individuals from 16 farms along two perpendicular transects, one by a river and the other by a road, in a 561,736-hectare rural landscape in central Argentina. A matrix of 764 SNPs was generated for population genetics and kinship analyses. No clear population structure emerged, suggesting high gene flow. However, farms from neighboring localities showed a tendency to cluster in the neighbor-joining tree. We detected isolation by distance along the road but not the river, and found half and full siblings over 30 km apart in both transects, suggesting active and passive dispersal by human transport. The road appears to function as a corridor across generations, linked to IBD, while no such pattern was found along the river. Nevertheless, we identified a few relatives over long distances along the river, suggesting that watercourses may facilitate dispersal, at least within a single generation. These findings help explain the challenge of controlling R. norvegicus on farms where control measures are often implemented individually by farmers. Rattus norvegicus RAD-Seq SNPs rural landscape dispersal Figures Figure 1 Figure 2 Figure 3 Full Text Supplementary Files OR1.xlsx OR2.pdf OR3.xlsx OR4.pdf OR5.pdf OR6.tiff OR7.xlsx Responsetopreviousreviewers.docx Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-8043840","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Research Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":543159846,"identity":"6f3fe096-b744-4d60-8f26-9114e1e4ac32","order_by":0,"name":"Ignacio Martin Videla","email":"data:image/png;base64,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","orcid":"https://orcid.org/0009-0004-7451-3439","institution":"CONICET: Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientificas y Tecnicas","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Ignacio","middleName":"Martin","lastName":"Videla","suffix":""},{"id":543159847,"identity":"17dffcd0-52e0-454d-a985-1c4fe931d3d6","order_by":1,"name":"Andrés Fernando Sánchez-Restrepo","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"CONICET: Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientificas y Tecnicas","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Andrés","middleName":"Fernando","lastName":"Sánchez-Restrepo","suffix":""},{"id":543159848,"identity":"5d148b39-8956-4b0a-b584-39556e16b004","order_by":2,"name":"Esteban Hasson","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"CONICET: Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientificas y Tecnicas","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Esteban","middleName":"","lastName":"Hasson","suffix":""},{"id":543159849,"identity":"0bc47a5d-26e6-4d0c-9419-b6f4b632c3d7","order_by":3,"name":"Rosario Lovera","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"CONICET: Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientificas y Tecnicas","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Rosario","middleName":"","lastName":"Lovera","suffix":""},{"id":543159850,"identity":"353b3866-12f4-4982-b075-d679b2736b1e","order_by":4,"name":"Viviana Andrea Confalonieri","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"CONICET: Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientificas y Tecnicas","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Viviana","middleName":"Andrea","lastName":"Confalonieri","suffix":""},{"id":543159851,"identity":"9346f2f1-e57d-4c29-abe3-23c7114e4819","order_by":5,"name":"Regino Cavia","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"CONICET: Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientificas y Tecnicas","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Regino","middleName":"","lastName":"Cavia","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2025-11-06 05:20:17","currentVersionCode":1,"declarations":"","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-8043840/v1","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-8043840/v1","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":96462060,"identity":"32a4ff21-98ac-4463-9917-29d1a8ed34f4","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:51","extension":"tiff","order_by":4,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":32012,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"Figure3.tiff","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/9ac109465b3567ec01877276.tiff"},{"id":96462057,"identity":"89309c1e-9da2-4393-8fe6-ad569d98ce90","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:50","extension":"xml","order_by":6,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":12787,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"mambMAMBD2500297.xml","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/df0eb4503ebcc96d9ec1eb8a.xml"},{"id":96462064,"identity":"b2a6d16b-d61a-4523-a413-c390f6a7bd96","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:51","extension":"xml","order_by":7,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":1379,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"MAMBD25002978963.go.xml","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/21f0c64957fa83089d5bfefd.xml"},{"id":96462062,"identity":"ef80d90f-adbe-42fd-897b-f12c703e4ecb","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:51","extension":"xml","order_by":8,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":896,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"MAMBD2500297Import.xml","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/3944665982d633d2de2e7356.xml"},{"id":96603131,"identity":"b21f736f-a8f4-47b1-aab0-275e1a981560","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:07:05","extension":"xml","order_by":17,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":200246,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"MAMBD25002970enriched.xml","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/c698c026d69287c02c5bc266.xml"},{"id":96462073,"identity":"017c07d1-1b06-4587-8968-0663802abeab","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:51","extension":"pdf","order_by":18,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":3689539,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"Figure1.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/009bf288d2d831689ffabbed.pdf"},{"id":96603379,"identity":"7d3abd86-2670-45dd-b3ab-9133d28926ee","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:08:50","extension":"pdf","order_by":19,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":1533653,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"Figure2.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/07ece582a761d49a70f541d2.pdf"},{"id":96462070,"identity":"11b49ce0-bd0f-46da-9031-baa1e58d952f","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:51","extension":"tiff","order_by":20,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":32012,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"Figure3.tiff","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/37a5e381fb4167c95b7549be.tiff"},{"id":96603390,"identity":"1ad0d90c-a893-4f87-b3ae-808e353d4d8f","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:08:54","extension":"png","order_by":21,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":17218,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"OnlineFigure3.png","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/7728fbb3d9a2f72745ed6878.png"},{"id":96462067,"identity":"fb9437c0-3891-447a-8d8b-e79d91276d55","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:51","extension":"xml","order_by":22,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":195149,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"MAMBD25002970structuring.xml","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/7085c63ac9c2766bf9d4c758.xml"},{"id":96603715,"identity":"6eefd62b-156f-4faf-8cb2-35177f800eb2","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:11:16","extension":"html","order_by":23,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":214481,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"earlyproof.html","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/73d01ef02670de81fe827354.html"},{"id":96462053,"identity":"091ce2d3-7d8c-4ea8-9f46-e83f84b6307a","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:50","extension":"jpg","order_by":1,"title":"Figure 1","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"figure","size":281724,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"\u003cp\u003eMap of the study area in central Argentina (a) and study area showing the perpendicular transects where the studied farms were located (b). The blue dotted line represents the river transect; the orange dotted line represents the road transect. Dots represent the sixteen sampling farms named with a letter that represents the initial of the Department where they are located: Marcos Paz, General Rodríguez and General Las Heras (M); Luján (L); San Andrés de Giles (G) and Exaltación de la Cruz (E) followed by a number for each farm. The genetic landscape (GLS) obtained by the spatial interpolation analysis is overlapped to the map (B) and the color key represents the degree of genetic differentiation: low genetic differentiation (blue) and high genetic differentiation (red)\u003c/p\u003e","description":"","filename":"Figure1.jpg","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/8c3007ef7c117f6c55b8e755.jpg"},{"id":96603066,"identity":"317b6a96-4e7e-4a3b-99c7-545462872dfa","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:06:35","extension":"jpg","order_by":2,"title":"Figure 2","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"figure","size":422203,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"\u003cp\u003ePopulation structure analyses results. Neighbor-joining tree (a) of sampling sites named as in Fig. 1, where each color represent each Department: Marcos Paz, General Rodríguez and General Las Heras (orange); Exaltación de la Cruz (fuchsia); San Andrés de Giles (blue) and Luján (green). Principal Component Analysis (b) representing the first two principal components which explained 4.1% and 3.4% of the genetic variance, respectively; each colour represents each farm. Heat-map of F\u003csub\u003eST \u003c/sub\u003epairwise comparisons between farms (c) with F\u003csub\u003eST\u003c/sub\u003e value increases from white to red\u003c/p\u003e","description":"","filename":"Figure2.jpg","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/76a624a70e1a54006e53651d.jpg"},{"id":96462052,"identity":"fef3cc28-f002-4908-aa00-3664336dd706","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:50","extension":"jpg","order_by":3,"title":"Figure 3","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"figure","size":60978,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"\u003cp\u003eProportions of half (a) and full (b) siblings against geographic distance for the road (red) and for the river (blue)\u003c/p\u003e","description":"","filename":"Figure3.jpg","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/7c9f4fc4a84d9bd32cfec686.jpg"},{"id":99816991,"identity":"d8e32f05-1fb1-48c9-a0ce-dd0850ec5f51","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-01-08 14:48:26","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":24109085,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"MAMBPDF.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1_covered_d6cfe50d-3013-453b-ae42-cbbb90a16a18.pdf"},{"id":96602895,"identity":"e186caed-0b00-4e76-8634-c489b33107ca","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:04:23","extension":"xlsx","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":21505,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"OR1.xlsx","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/e178d5921ab15808d2b30a62.xlsx"},{"id":96462058,"identity":"af29f36a-fa2e-4db4-a24d-5bfe3aa4510d","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:51","extension":"pdf","order_by":2,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":9178,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"OR2.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/49d90a954454cd7762b34a17.pdf"},{"id":96603325,"identity":"e2bed857-b496-4418-9a89-5e7ad661bde7","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:08:15","extension":"xlsx","order_by":3,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":18867,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"OR3.xlsx","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/11ba1b9e682e79e4400d6ba9.xlsx"},{"id":96462066,"identity":"af9bd8ce-9339-48f3-b62b-5bc7d69c2248","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:51","extension":"pdf","order_by":4,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":462749,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"OR4.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/9658b9d89229f3daabf453aa.pdf"},{"id":96603069,"identity":"56ca66e8-c773-490e-838e-c0257589a7f3","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:06:36","extension":"pdf","order_by":5,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":54257,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"OR5.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/babb0a58f581fd0bc67bad34.pdf"},{"id":96603279,"identity":"5441f37a-e49e-47b2-af6b-7f9aa4af1d53","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:07:59","extension":"tiff","order_by":6,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":159532,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"OR6.tiff","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/2aaaa0bd8dcdbd0ef2c0e33e.tiff"},{"id":96603013,"identity":"cf2d5f5e-0919-4c1f-9ab0-2999d9ddbb46","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-24 09:06:03","extension":"xlsx","order_by":7,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":17675,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"OR7.xlsx","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/355f7d850842081382487dff.xlsx"},{"id":96462061,"identity":"231c8b0e-c86d-41c3-9835-df7865db5fbb","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-21 10:27:51","extension":"docx","order_by":8,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":47283,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"Responsetopreviousreviewers.docx","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8043840/v1/059f2c1872147868aa7bc94a.docx"}],"financialInterests":"","formattedTitle":"How do Rattus norvegicus disperse in rural landscapes? Insights from population genomics on livestock farms","fulltext":[],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":false,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":false,"hideJournal":true,"highlight":"","institution":"","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"Rattus norvegicus, RAD-Seq, SNPs, rural landscape, dispersal","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-8043840/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-8043840/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eRattus norvegicus\u003c/em\u003e is a global pest in rural landscapes, yet little is known about its dispersal in these environments. We addressed this issue using RAD-seq markers for 93 individuals from 16 farms along two perpendicular transects, one by a river and the other by a road, in a 561,736-hectare rural landscape in central Argentina. A matrix of 764 SNPs was generated for population genetics and kinship analyses. No clear population structure emerged, suggesting high gene flow. However, farms from neighboring localities showed a tendency to cluster in the neighbor-joining tree. We detected isolation by distance along the road but not the river, and found half and full siblings over 30 km apart in both transects, suggesting active and passive dispersal by human transport. The road appears to function as a corridor across generations, linked to IBD, while no such pattern was found along the river. Nevertheless, we identified a few relatives over long distances along the river, suggesting that watercourses may facilitate dispersal, at least within a single generation. These findings help explain the challenge of controlling \u003cem\u003eR. norvegicus\u003c/em\u003e on farms where control measures are often implemented individually by farmers.\u003c/p\u003e","manuscriptTitle":"How do Rattus norvegicus disperse in rural landscapes? Insights from population genomics on livestock farms","msid":"","msnumber":"","nonDraftVersions":[{"code":1,"date":"2025-11-21 10:27:46","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-8043840/v1","editorialEvents":[{"type":"communityComments","content":0}],"status":"published","journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true}}],"origin":"","ownerIdentity":"96cd4466-75d6-4f69-9b74-2eb1447b165d","owner":[],"postedDate":"November 21st, 2025","published":true,"recentEditorialEvents":[],"rejectedJournal":[],"revision":"","amendment":"","status":"posted","subjectAreas":[],"tags":[],"updatedAt":"2026-01-08T14:38:48+00:00","versionOfRecord":[],"versionCreatedAt":"2025-11-21 10:27:46","video":"","vorDoi":"","vorDoiUrl":"","workflowStages":[]},"version":"v1","identity":"rs-8043840","journalConfig":"researchsquare"},"__N_SSP":true},"page":"/article/[identity]/[[...version]]","query":{"redirect":"/article/rs-8043840","identity":"rs-8043840","version":["v1"]},"buildId":"8U1c8b4HqxoKbykW_rLl7","isFallback":false,"isExperimentalCompile":false,"dynamicIds":[84888],"gssp":true,"scriptLoader":[]}