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Abstract  The musk shrew (Suncus murinus) is an insectivore species that inhabits tropical and subtropical Asia widely. To clarify the genetic relationship among wild musk shrew populations, we examined the electrophoretic variants of biparentally inherited genetic markers at 10 loci coding for eight blood proteins/enzymes in a total of 639 animals and compared the results obtained from the mitochondrial DNA data. The principal-component analysis performed using the allele frequency data revealed that the 17 populations could be divided into two major groups, a South Asian group and a Southeast Asian group that includes several island populations bound by Myanmar. The degrees of genetic divergence among populations were higher within the Southeast Asian group than within the South Asian group. This finding was incongruent with the mtDNA diversity. Analysis conducted at the individual level showed that a shrew from the central region in Myanmar that carries a South Asian type of mtDNA showed the electrophoretic variants specific to the Southeast Asian group, suggesting that this region is a contact zone between the two major groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The musk shrew (Suncus murinus) is a small mammalian species belonging to Insectivora. It is widely distributed in Asia. To identify the genetic relationship among wild musk shrew populations and examine its migration route, we investigated the populations of Cambodia and Bhutan by using mitochondrial DNA restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis and compared them with other Asian populations previously described. Four haplotypes were detected in Cambodia and eight in Bhutan. A total of 53 haplotypes were detected in Asia and were classified largely into two groups, the Continental and Island types, based on a minimum spanning network. From the distribution of mtDNA types in wild musk shrews, three major population groups are identified in Asia: South Asia, Southeast Asia, and Malay. It is suggested that the Malay population group was a mix of South and Southeast Asian population groups and that this was a contact area of the two groups. In addition, other contact areas between the South and Southeast Asian groups exist in Myanmar, but unlike the Malay, the Myanmar area was the border of these groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]