COMPARATIVE-ANALYSIS OF INTRAPOPULATION AND INTERPOPULATION GENETIC DIVERSITY IN BUFO-BUFO, USING ALLOZYME, SINGLE-LOCUS MICROSATELLITE, MINISATELLITE, AND MULTILOCUS MINISATELLITE DATA

Estimates of genetic diversity within, and of variation among, semi-is olated populations of the common toad (Bufo bufo) were derived and com pared across four classes of nuclear genetic markers, including allozy mes, microsatellites, and single and multilocus minisatellites. Estima tes of multilocus heterozygosity and the number of alleles per locus d erived from allozymes were lower than for each class of variable numbe r of tandem repeat (VNTR) markers. The degree of interpopulation genet ic divergence as determined by genetic distance was generally concorda nt across all markers, although interpopulation variance in allozyme a llele frequency (as measure by F-statistics) was greater than that doc umented for each VNTR locus. For both classes of VNTR loci, migration appeared to have less influence than mutation on the extent of interpo pulation divergence. Analyses suggest that singly and multiply detecte d VNTR loci may be highly informative for population-level analyses ad dressing questions concerning population subdivision and breeding stru cture.