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Tiger/Snow Leopard Diet Analysis

DNA based diet analysis using high throughput sequencing provides us with high grade information of the prey species and other remaining from the feacal matter. This approach is quite effective and sensitive than the traditional diet analysis methods which mostly depend on the morphological identification of the undigested remains in the feaces. We aim to develop working protocol for snowleopard diet analyses based on the next-generation sequencing. DNA will be extracted from thefeaces samples and amplified using mitochondrial 12S rRNA gene targeting about 100 bp.Snow-leopard specific blocking oligonucleotide will be used to block the predator sequence. A library will be constructed using Nextera XT Index Kit using the amplified products and will be sequenced in the Miseq platform. The sequence generated from the Miseq system will be assembled and analyzed using Bioinformatics software. The data produced will help us understand the diet preference of the elusive species in the high altitude. This information will also help us track diverse species found in the higher altitude regions.