Understanding the genetic information of endangered species is very important to conservation and management of wildlife. In this study, we collected scats in Qilianshan National Park (QNP) and Sanjiangyuan National Park (SNP) which are important distribution areas for snow leopard in China. Using a molecular panel that included the mtDNA cytb gene, polymorphic microsatellite loci, we identified snow leopard scat, determined the number of individuals observed, and evaluated genetic diversity. A total of 286 scats were collected and 86 of these were from the snow leopard. Among all scats, 41 individual snow leopard were detected based on unique composite microsatellite genotypes, including 26 in QNP and 15 in SNP. The results indicated that the genetic diversity in QNP and SNP was relatively low based on the numbers of alleles and effective alleles, observed heterozygosity, expected heterozygosity and polymorphism information content. The diversity was higher in QNP than in SNP. Population genetic structure analysis revealed all the snow leopard individuals were divided into 3 genetic clusters and these surveyed populations had moderate levels of differentiation. Two of clusters included individuals from distant areas (QLS and DC) indicating the potential for corridors that link these subpopulations. Our study provides important information on the status and genetic diversity of the endangered snow leopard populations in two critical areas of China.

掌握遗传信息对濒危物种的保护和管理具有重要意义。本研究在我国雪豹重要分布区祁连山和三江源国家公园分别采集粪便样品，利用mtDNA的cyt b基因、微卫星多态性位点进行了雪豹的物种鉴定、个体识别和种群遗传结构评估。在采集286份疑似雪豹粪便样品中，成功的对86份雪豹样品进行了扩增鉴定，利用微卫星位点进行个体识别获得41只雪豹个体，其中祁连山国家公园26只，三江源国家公园15只。通过等位基因数、有效等位基因数、观测杂合度、期望杂合度、多态信息含量等指标进行种群遗传多样性评估，认为雪豹种群遗传多样性相对较低，但祁连山国家公园雪豹种群遗传多样性相对较高。STRUCTURE进行群体遗传结构分析表明，4个种群可以划分为3个遗传类群，祁连山国家公园的种群（YCW和QLS）与三江源国家种群(DC和SJ)的遗传差异，可能与种群间的地理隔离存在明显的相似性。