Repeated mitochondrial capture with limited genomic introgression in a lizard group

Mitochondrial introgression is common among animals and is often first identified through mitonuclear discordance — discrepancies between evolutionary relationships inferred from mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) and nuclear DNA (nuDNA). Over recent decades, genomic data have also revealed extensive nuclear introgression in many animal groups, with implications for genetic and phenotypic diversity. However, the extent to which mtDNA introgression corresponds to nuDNA introgression varies. Here, we investigated historical and recent introgression in the Gehyra nana-occidentalis clade, a complex group of Australian geckos with documented cases of mitonuclear discordance suggestive of repeated mtDNA introgression. We hypothesised that mitonuclear discordance in this clade reflects mtDNA introgression with substantial nuclear introgression. Despite evidence of repeated mtDNA introgression, however, we found little to no evidence of historical nuDNA introgression using exon capture and genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) data. We also found no evidence of gene flow at modern contact zones and detected only a single early generation hybrid. Unsurprising given these results, we found no evidence of transgressive, intermediate, or more variable morphological phenotypes in taxa with introgressed mtDNA. These findings suggest that hybridisation in this system has, at least in some cases, resulted in repeated mitochondrial introgression with little or no nuclear introgression. This pattern aligns with other studies showing limited nuDNA introgression in taxa with mitonuclear discordance, highlighting a potentially broader trend in animal radiations. DOI https://doi.org/10.32942/X2QP82 Subjects Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Genetics and Genomics, Life Sciences

Mitonuclear discordance, contact zone, hybridisation, exon capture, SNP, Gehyra, contact zone, hybridisation, exon capture, SNP, Gehyra Dates Published: 2025-02-19 11:07 Last Updated: 2025-04-22 17:00 Older Versions License CC-By Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Additional Metadata Data and Code Availability Statement: All data and R code available at https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.28440584 Language: English