What unusual finding regarding genetic diversity did water voles display during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition?
Answer
They did not exhibit a major drop in overall genetic diversity across the transition
From an evolutionary perspective, the water vole's ability to maintain its overall genetic breadth across the challenging period marking the end of the Pleistocene and the start of the Holocene is noteworthy. While many Holarctic fauna experienced severe bottlenecks or significant diversity loss due to drastic climatic shifts and ice sheet dynamics, water voles managed to persist across various European refugia. This persistence allowed them to retain a wide variety of lineages, meaning they did not suffer the major collapse in overall genetic diversity often seen in species transitioning out of the last Ice Age.
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