The complete mitochondrial genome of Lacerta bilineata and comparison with its closely related congener L. Viridis

Abstract

We sequenced the mitochondrial genome of the Western green lizard (Lacerta bilineata) using Illumina technology and additional Sanger sequencing. The assembled 17 086 bp mitogenome had a GC content of 40.32% and consisted of 13 protein-coding genes, 22 tRNA genes, two rRNA genes, and one control region (CR), with a gene order identical to the chordate consensus. In addition, we re-sequenced the mitogenome of the closely related Eastern green lizard L. viridis using the same techniques as for L. bilineata. The mitogenomes of L. bilineata and L. viridis showed a sequence identity of 94.4% and 99.9%, respectively, relative to the previously published L. viridis mitogenome. The phylogenetic reconstruction based on 17 Lacertinae mitogenomes using Anolis carolinensis as the outgroup supported L. bilineata and its sister species L. viridis as distinct lineages.

• Complete mitochondrial genome
• Illumina sequencing
• Lacerta bilineata
• Lacerta viridis
• Lacertinae
• phylogeny

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Dr. C. Helm, Dr. D. Bernhard, R. Wolf, and Dr. M. Gerth for their help in the laboratory and Dr. M. Bernt for help with the annotation. The specimen from Hungary was kindly collected and provided by the team of Szabolcs Lengyel, Centre for Ecological Research, Hungarian Academy of Science. Capture permit (No. 13778-7/2013) was issued by the North Hungarian Environmental Protection, Nature Conservation and Water Management Inspectorate.

Declaration of interest

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper. The project was funded by the German Science Foundation (FZT 118). Capture permit (No. 36) for the French specimen was issued by the Prefet de la Cote-d’Or. R. F. is financed by FCT under the Programa Operacional Potencial Humano – Quadro de Referência Estratégico Nacional from the European Social Fund and the Portuguese Ministério da Educação e Ciência through the postdoctoral fellowship SFRH/BPD/89313/2012. K. N. is supported by the Volkswagen Foundation through the initiative “Evolutionary Biology”.