The karyology of ’lacerta’ mosorensis kolombatovic, 1886, and its bearing on phylogenetic relationships to other european mountain lizards

Abstract

The results are presented of a chromosomal study performed by means standard and banding staining methods in the Mosor rock lizard, ’Lacerta’ mosorensis, the last European mountain lizard to be karyotyped. It had a karyotype of 2n = 38 elements, 36 telocentric macrochromosomes + 2 microchromosomes, and NORs on peritelomeric regions of a medium-small chromosome pair. C-banding staining disclosed the presence of heteromorphic Z and W sex chromosomes. The W chromosome appeared to be completely heterochromatic and smaller than the Z one, which, instead, was mostly euchromatic. The results obtained show that ’L.’ mosorensis is karyologically unrelated to other European mountain lizards, whose karyotypes display a different chromosome number and/or localization of NORs. © 2005 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.