date April 25, 2018
Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
New research has found that forest elephant populations across Central Africa are genetically quite similar to one another. Conserving this critically endangered species across its range is crucial to preserving local plant diversity in Central and West African Afrotropical forests -- meaning conservationists could save many species by protecting one.
Although it is erroneously treated as a subspecies, the dwindling African forest elephant is a genetically distinct species. New University of Illinois research has found that forest elephant populations across Central Africa are genetically quite similar to one another. Conserving this critically endangered species across its range is crucial to preserving local plant diversity in Central and West African Afrotropical forests -- meaning conservationists could save many species by protecting one.
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