Fig. 1

Population genetic structure of the global snow leopards based on whole-genome SNPs. A Geographic distribution of wild snow leopard samples in this study. Herein, only samples with known geographical sources were presented (Table S1). Triangles indicate the southern lineage, while circles represent the northern lineage. Location abbreviations are as follows: RU (Russia), MG (Mongolia), TA (Tajikistan), IM (Inner Mongolia, China), XJ (Xinjiang, China), TB (Tibet, China), QH (Qinghai, China), GS (Gansu, China), and SC (Sichuan, China). B Neighboring-joining phylogenetic tree of snow leopards based on whole-genome SNPs, with the tiger as an outgroup. Samples marked in brown represent the northern lineage, while those in blue represent the southern lineage. The values on the tree nodes indicate the bootstrap support. C ADMIXTURE analysis of snow leopards based on whole-genome SNPs, with K values from 2 to 4. The model with K = 2 exhibited the lowest cross-validation error rate. D Principal component analysis (PCA) of snow leopards based on whole-genome SNPs