Reconstruction of karyotype evolution in core Glires. I. The genome homology revealed by comparative chromosome painting.

Glires represent a eutherian clade consisting of rodents and lagomorphs (hares, rabbits, and pikas). Chromosome evolution of Glires is known to have variable rates in different groups: from slowly evolving lagomorphs and squirrels to extremely rapidly evolving muroids. Previous interordinal homology maps between slowly evolving Glires were based on comparison with humans. Here, we used sets of chromosome-specific probes from Tamias sibiricus (Sciuridae), Castor fiber (Castoridae) and humans to study karyotypes of six ground squirrels (genera Marmota and Spermophilus) and one tree squirrel (genus Sciurus), mountain hare (genus Lepus), and rabbit (genus Oryctolagus). These data supplemented with GTG banding comparisons allowed us to build comparative chromosome maps. Our data showed the absence of previously found squirrel associations HSA 1/8 and 2/17 in the Eurasian ground squirrels--sousliks and woodchucks, and disruptions of squirrel HSA 10/13 and HSA 8/4/8/12/22 syntenies in the four Spermophilus species studied here. We found that the karyotypes of Sciuridae and Leporidae are highly conserved and close to the Rodentia ancestral karyotype, while Castoridae chromosomes underwent many more changes. We suggest that Lagomorpha and Sciuridae (in contrast to all other rodent families) should be considered as core Glires lineages, characterized by cytogenetically conserved karyotypes which contain chromosomal elements inherent to karyotype of common Glires ancestor. Our data allowed us to further refine the putative ancestral karyotypes of Rodentia. We also describe here the putative ancestral karyotypes of Glires and lagomorphs.