Identification of deer species (Cervidae, Cetartiodactyla) in China using mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (mtDNA COI)

In China, many deer species are threatened and their wild populations are decreasing. In this study, a segment of mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) was used as a DNA barcode to identify Cervidae species. COI sequences of 30 individuals from nine species were determined. Together with 148 sequences from BOLD and Genbank, a total of 178 sequences from 21 species of the family Cervidae were analyzed. The results showed that all species had unique COI sequences, and there was no barcode sharing among them. The mean K2P distances within species, genus, and family were 1.3%, 3.4%, and 8.9%, respectively. The neighbor-joining (NJ) tree was in most cases concordant with modern deer classification. Three species showed maximum intraspecific divergences higher than their minimum interspecific divergences. However, all species could be discriminated by their diagnostic characters in BLOG analysis. The present study confirmed that COI barcodes can effectively distinguish Cervidae species in China.