(Elaine Ostrander et al. / Science Advances, 2023 https://go.nature.com/3mp2Hzc)
An international team of scientists led by Elaine Ostrander from the US National Human Genome Research Institute sequenced the DNA of 302 dogs living in the vicinity of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.
The researchers found that dogs that live directly at the power plant constitute a separate isolated population consisting of three families.
At the same time, scientists identified dogs from the city of Chernobyl as a separate population.
The results of this population-based study should form the basis for further study of how radiation in the exclusion zone affects living organisms.
After the accident at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in April 1986, a huge amount of radionuclides entered the atmosphere: cesium-137, iodine-131 and many others.
The greatest contamination occurred in the area of 2,600 square kilometers adjacent to the station, which is now considered an exclusion zone.
After the accident, the number of wild animal populations inside the zone was significantly reduced, and although some species have recovered, some have not been able to do so.
It remains unclear how the catastrophe affected the genetic diversity of species.
On the one hand, a decrease in the number in a population inevitably leads to its decrease.
On the other hand, intense background radiation increases the frequency of mutations, which potentially increases genetic diversity.
Therefore, the Ostrander team decided to study how the population composition of dogs living in the exclusion zone has changed.
THE STUDY
Between 2017 and 2019, three veterinary clinics were opened inside the exclusion zone, which provided assistance to stray dogs living in the zone.
Scientists had recorded an increase in the population of wild dogs over 800 individuals.
During this period, doctors obtained blood samples from 302 dogs and stored them for later analysis:
- 132 samples were obtained from dogs living directly on the territory of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant
- 154 from dogs living 15 kilometers from the station in the city of Chernobyl
- 16 living in the city of Slavutych, 45 kilometers from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant
Workers of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant were resettled in Slavutich after the accident, and many workers lived there for a long time before the accident.
DNA sequencing has shown that there are three isolated populations living in the respective capture sites, although individuals within them have family ties with other populations.
At the same time, scientists found that dogs living inside the Chernobyl nuclear power plant itself are genetically divided into three isolated families with first-order kinship ties (parents-children, brothers-sisters).
In addition, dogs from Chernobyl have the highest heterozygosity rate compared to dogs from other study areas.
After that, the scientists studied how isolated dog populations in all three studied regions were from mixing genetic material from other populations.
It turned out that the individuals that live at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant mixed with other dogs least of all.
They were followed by dogs from Chernobyl, and the least isolated population was a group of dogs in Slavutych.
All this data makes it possible to distinguish dogs that live in the Chernobyl exclusion zone (including at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant itself) into separate populations.
This isolation paves the way for further study of these dogs, like the study of how living in areas massively contaminated with radionuclides affects large mammals.
And is of particular value to understand how radioactivity affects mammals’ genetic material.
Sources:
- Science Advances: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.ade2537
- Nature: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00629-6
- NYT: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/03/science/chernobyl-dogs-dna.html
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