DNA Barcoding Distinguishes Pest Species of the Black Fly Genus <I>Cnephia</I> (Diptera: Simuliidae)

Abstract

Accurate species identification is essential for cost-effective pest control strategies. We tested the utility of COI barcodes for identifying members of the black fly genus Cnephia Enderlein (Diptera: Simuliidae). Our efforts focus on four Nearctic Cnephia species-Cnephia dacotensis (Dyar & Shannon), Cnephia eremities Shewell, Cnephia ornithophilia (Davies, Peterson & Wood), and Cnephia pecuarum (Riley)--the latter two being current or potential targets of biological control programs. We also analyzed one Palearctic species, Cnephia pallipes (Fries). Although Cnephia adults can be identified anatomically to species, control programs target the larval stage, which is difficult or impossible to distinguish morphologically. By using neighbor-joining, maximum parsimony, and Bayesian methods, we found that COI barcodes successfully identified three Nearctic Cnephia species, but not C. pecuarum. The Palearctic C. pallipes was also successfully identified. Despite nonmonophyly of C. pecuarum, we show that data from COI barcoding, in combination with geographical and ecological information, can be used to distinguish all four Nearctic species. Finally, we discussed 1) possible reasons for paraphyly in C. pecuarum, 2) topological concordance to previously reported chromosomal dendrograms, and 3) evolution of diverse feeding strategies within the genus Cnephia.

ITS2 para la identificación de Califóridos (Diptera: Calliphoridae) de importancia forense en Colombia

“…Este método ha sido aplicado exitosamente en varios estudios taxonómicos en diferentes grupos del orden Diptera (e.g. Renaud et al, 2012;Conflitti et al 2013;Chukwunonso et al, 2013) y también ha sido utililzado para identificar especies de califóridos en diferentes países (e.g. Nelson et al, 2007;Jordaens et al, 2013) y en Colombia tanto con COI como con CytB (Giraldo et al, 2011;Solano et al, 2013).…”

Intraspecific Genetic Diversity of Two Black Fly Species (Diptera: Simuliidae) from South India using DNA Barcode Based RFLP Analysis

“…Cytological identification is potential to identify larval stages only by using the giant polytene chromosomes (Conflitti et al, 2013). In recent years, molecular approaches in the taxonomy achieved rapid advancement for accurate identification of species by DNA barcodes.…”

“…The DNA analysis has the advantage that differentiation can be undertaken at any developmental stage (Shaikevich, 2007). The DNA barcoding analysis received enough pledge for identification of black fly (Conflitti et al, 2013;Pramual et al, 2011). Although, genetic diversity studies using Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism (RFLP) provided high-quality of outcomes in various species of insects, DNA barcode based RFLP is an effective tool to analyze polymorphism in insect species and consent to the identification of samples at any developmental stages (Shaikevich, 2007;Walsh et al, 2011).…”

“…Genetic diversity studies in black flies have been conducted on Simulium gravelyi by Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA (RAPD) (Anbalagan et al, 2012), Psilopelmia by internal transcribed spacer 1 of the nuclear ribosomal RNA gene (Tang et al, 1998), Cnephia by DNA barcode gene (Conflitti et al, 2013) and Simulium tani by DNA barcoding genes (COI and COII) (Low et al, 2014). Less attention has received on DNA barcode based RFLP analysis in black fly.…”

Biodiversidad latinoamericana y sus perspectivas de estudio con tecnologías ‘ómicas’

“…Asimismo, sus características inherentes lo han hecho una herramienta fundamental en áreas como la conservación y la agricultura. Su aplicación se ha extendido en el análisis de la trazabilidad de los alimentos (Galimberti et al, 2013), estudios de plagas (Conflitti et al, 2013), especies invasoras (Nadel et al, 2010), esclarecer las relaciones taxonómicas entre especies relacionadas (Carrizo García et al, 2016), y en el control del tráfico ilegal de especies (Gonçalves et al, 2015). Ha habido un aumento paulatino en la participación de los países de América Latina en los repositorios de códigos de barras.…”