GENETIC, MORPHOLOGY AND ECHOLOCATION VARIATION OF EVENING BATS (GENUS MYOTIS) FROM BORNEO

• Main Author: NAR, Siti-Syamim
• Format: Final Year Project Report
• Language: English; English
• Published: None 2020
• Subjects: QL Zoology
• Online Access: http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/42541/3/Bach.%20Sc.%20_Siti%20Syamim%20Nurfatihah%20-%2024%20pages.pdf; http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/42541/4/Bach.%20Sc.%20_Siti%20Syamim%20Nurfatihah.ftext.pdf; http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/42541/

The island of Borneo is considered as the biodiversity hotspot with a high number of endemicity. The species of bats represent a significant component of the terrestrial mammals on the island. The genus Myotis is an insectivorous bat which is a diverse and widespread group from the family Vespertilionidae. Their mouse-eared structure and distinct dentition characterised the genus. The genus has high interspecific diversity that potentially represent cryptic diversity. Therefore, it is important to study the taxonomical differentiation of the members from this genus to better describe their diversity. This is especially important in Borneo where studies on this group is lacking and further hampered by species misidentifications. Hence, three parameters of species identifications in insectivorous bats were explored which is genetic analysis, morphological measurements and echolocation variations. Through genetic analysis on the sequences of mtDNA at cytb region, three phylogenetic trees were constructed showing a similar topology and clade members with the Pairwise Distance computation to support the differences. The analysis of morphological measurements using Discrimination Function Analysis (DFA) showed an overlap of the character functions in the scatter plot of this analysis for different species of Myotis. Echolocation calls from several species of Myotis were described and compared on its call parameters. However, it is not sufficient in determining the species as there is a variety of call structure according to the surrounding during the call’s recordings. Hence, it is important in combining these three parameters in order to have a more reliable method in species identification.