Daily activity rhythms are nearly universal among animals and their specific pattern is an adaptation of each species to its ecological niche. Owing to the extremely consistent nocturnal patterns of activity shown by golden hamsters ( Mesocricetus auratus ) in the laboratory, this species is a prime model for studying the mechanisms controlling circadian rhythms. In contrast to laboratory data, we discovered that female hamsters in the wild were almost exclusively diurnal. These results raise many questions about the ecological variables that shape the activity patterns in golden hamsters and the differences between laboratory and field results.

We report a new species of Spermophilus ( Rodentia: Sciuridae), here designated as S. torosensis sp. nov., distributed in the Taurus Mountains in southern Anatolia, Turkey. A total of 161 specimens of the genus Spermophilus from Turkey and Iran were analyzed for their morphological, morphometric, and karyological characteristics. Uni- and multi-variate statistical analyses of morphologic data for 95 adult specimens yielded 4 distinct groups. Taxonomic evaluations classified the specimens into 4 species Spermophilus citellus, S. xanthopymnus, S. fulvus and S. torosensis sp. nov. Morphometrics, coat coloration, a brush-shaped tail, and a NFa value of 72 are diagnostic characters that distinguish S. torosensis sp. nov. from the other species. In Turkey, S. torosensis sp. nov. was found in 6 locations. The karyotype of S. fulvus also is described for the first time as 2n= 36, NFa= 70 and NFa= 66; new karyotypic data is reported for S. xanthoprymnus from Iran and Turkey.

Past climatic fluctuations influenced forest habitats and impacted heavily the distribution of forest species, such as the edible dormouse, by changi

We described the genetic variation of cytochrome b gene sequences of blind mole rats in Turkey. We examined 47 individuals belonging to nine cytotypes of three superspecies Nannospalax leucodon, N. xanthodon and N. ehrenbergi in the 402bp gene sequence of cytochrome b. Phylogenetic analyses showed that relationships between cytotypes were well supported, but deeper divergence between species showed insignificant relationships. Cytotypes of N. xanthodon with low diploid number of chromosomes from western Turkey formed a monophyletic group distinct from the populations with higher number of chromosomes (2n = 56-60). The monophyly of N. xanthodon was supported with respect to N. leucodon (2n = 56) in the Bayesian and maximum likelihood phylogenies. The divergence between two analyzed cytotypes of N. ehrenbergi (2n = 52, 2n = 56) was 9.4 %, and the Kilis cytotype (2n = 52) appeared as the basal branch of the whole analysed dataset. N. ehrenbergi cytotypes were paraphyletic and they formed unsupported relationships with previously described N. galili (2n = 52), N. golani (2n = 54), N. carmeli (2n = 58) and N. judaei (2n = 60) from Israel. The results of this study showed that the Nannospalax species complex most likely represents more species than currently recognized, especially in N. xanthodon. We suggest that cytotypes of N. xanthodon and N. ehrenbergi from Turkey should be investigated in detail as possible candidates for being separate species.

Speciation and the phylogenetic relationships of species in the Guentheri Group in Turkey, which have a diploid chromosome number of 54, were studied using mitochondrial mt-co1, mt-cyb and 12S rRNA gene markers. A Bayesian Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) tree clearly separated the Thrace and western and southeastern Anatolia populations. Genetic distance values (d) appeared relatively high in the southeastern Anatolia population (Microtus guentheri) from other populations, but rather low distance values were found between Thrace and western Anatolia populations. Our findings support the earlier classification of M. guentheri as a different species that previously split from the basal population of western Anatolia. However, Kimura two-parameter (K2P) values greater than 10% are generally accepted for specification, and they were lower than this in all groups. So, the genetic distances of the Turkish Thrace and western Anatolia populations do not support the suggestion that the western Anatolia population is a separate species. But this value is sometimes very low in newly evolved and approximate species. Thus, the populations of Turkish Thrace and western Anatolia are tentatively referred to Microtus hartingi due to the geographical separation of the Dardanelle and Bosphorus Straits for fossorial and surface-dwelling species even in the glacial connections.