Abstract

NARDELLI, Maximiliano  and  TUNEZ, Juan I. Contributions of conservation genetics to the study of neotropical mammals: review and critical analysis. Ecol. austral [online]. 2017, vol.27, n.3, pp.421-436. ISSN 1667-782X.

Although all living beings modify their environment, our species has acquired the ability to do so on a superlative space-time scale. As a result of industrialization and the use of new technologies, the anthropic impact has been increasing in the last centuries, causing the decrease in population sizes or the extinction of numerous wild populations. In this sense, from the field of conservation genetics, diverse efforts have been made in the last decades in order to provide new knowledge that contributes to the conservation of populations, species and habitats. The properties of the different molecular markers have allowed studying the genetic variability of the species and how it is structured in the populations, defining the so-called Management Units, genetic units whose name derives from extractivist activities. In this article we perform a review and critical analysis of the scientific efforts in the area of conservation genetics carried out between the years 2006 and 2015 for the conservation of mammals of the Neotropics, criticize the concept of Management Unit and analyze future perspectives in the field of conservation genetics of neotropical mammals.

Keywords : Conservation biology; Neotropical fauna; Threatened species; Molecular markers.