Molecular evolution of the Colobinae

The Colobinae are one of the two subfamilies in the family Cercopithecidae. They evolved on two continents - Asia and Africa, where the Asian colobine monkeys are much more diverse than the African ones. All colobines have a specially adapted stomach which is sacculated and supports bacterial colonies. These bacteria enable the colobines to digest cellulose in their diet of leaves, unripe fruit and seeds. Most colobines have a long tail and no or only short thumbs. The most famous representative is the proboscis monkey (Nasalis larvatus) from Borneo.

In contrast to the Cercopithecinae e.g. macaques or baboons, colobines are not very common in zoos and, hence, information is relative rare. For example, there is still no consensus about how many genera or species should be recognised. One of the major topics within colobine evolution is the question about the monophyly of each of the Asian and African representatives.

In our studies on colobine evolution, we analyse sequences of the mitochondrial genome to reconstruct the phylogenetic relationships of colobine genera and species. Currently we have analysed 260 individuals representing roughly 40 species. The results give clear phylogenetic relationships.