ON THE EDGE OF EXTINCTION - A - THE TIGER (Panthera tigris)

[GuateGojira]

(12-06-2014, 08:55 PM)'Pckts' Wrote: When a tiger sub species goes extinct, do all of the genes for that sub species go extinct as well?
Would neighboring tigers still carry the gene that caused the branch off in the first place?

I wonder if its possible for a tiger or any big cat species to go extinct then if the right circumstances present it self, is it possible for that sub species to come back if two cats who carry the gene, even a small portion of it pro create?

Has anybody got any info on it?

 

If we focus in the Sunda tigers, at this moment, I am not aware of a published paper about the genetic of Java-Bali tigers.

If a subspecies (If is a real one) got extinct, the genes surely will die too. This is based in the "75% difference" posted by Dr Kitchener. So, a real subspecies most be 75% different from the "main" population, so some of the genes most be unique.

Now, in the case of the tiger, it is possible that some of the genes could still be alive in the closer population, which is the Sumatran tiger, after all, based on morphology, this population seems to be a hybrid between the mainland and the Sunda tigers.

On the last question, I guess that the answer will be no, because although two animals carrying the genes of the extinct population will mate, the product will be a mix of other genes from other populations too. So it will have characteristics of the two populations, it will not be pure, this is the case of the "Barbary" lions of Rabat Zoo, which has been proved to have a Central African origin, from they mother side (mtDNA).
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