ELECTROPHORETIC AND CHROMOSOMAL VARIATION IN CAPTIVE ASIAN ELEPHANTS (ELEPHAS-MAXIMUS)

To investigate genetic diversity in captive Asian elephants (Elephas m aximus), a total of 26 individuals from toes in the German cities of B erlin, Hamburg, and Leipzig, and from Zurich, Switzerland, were invest igated for electrophoretic variation at 44 presumptive blood protein a nd enzyme coding loci. The proportion of polymorphic loci (P = 4.6%) a nd average heterozygosity (H = 1.4%) in the specimens studied were ver y low. The distribution of alleles and genotypes suggested some geneti c differentiation among the source populations of our elephants, most of which were wild born. Since our results are in accordance with thos e of a previous survey on wild populations, low genetic variation in t he Asian elephant is not only associated with captive propagation. Tog ether with differences in the incidence of alleles among populations, it is probably largely due to low effective sizes of wild Asian elepha nt stocks and to species-specific breeding tactics. Standard karyotype analysis was carried out for 11 individuals, and in some cases, heter ochromatin staining by Giemsa C-banding and reverse fluorochrome stain ing were performed. Heterochromatin polymorphism was found in four chr omosome pairs, including two satellited pairs, and is considered an im portant marker for population genetic investigations. One of the 11 in dividuals studied was found to be heterozygous for a centric fusion of two small acrocentrics. The implications of our results for breeding programs of Asian elephants are discussed. (C) 1995 Wiley-Liss, Inc.