Molecular phylogeny of Trissolcus wasps (Hymenoptera, Scelionidae) associated with Halyomorpha halys (Hemiptera, Pentatomidae)

Abstract

As the brown marmorated stink bug (Halyomorpha halys) has spread across the Northern Hemisphere, research on its egg parasitoids has increased accordingly. These studies have included species-level taxonomy, experimental assessments of host ranges in quarantine, and surveys to assess parasitism in the field. We here present a molecular phylogeny of Trissolcus that includes all species that have been reared from live H. halys eggs. Species-group concepts are discussed and revised in the light of the phylogenetic analyses. The analyses indicate that the ability to successfully parasitize H. halys eggs is not phylogenetically constrained, but the most effective parasitoids are all found in the flavipes species group.

A morphological, biological and molecular approach reveals four cryptic species of Trissolcus Ashmead (Hymenoptera, Scelionidae), egg parasitoids of Pentatomidae (Hemiptera)

“…This study employed such an approach, using morphology, mating studies and molecular analysis to resolve four species from the concept of T. semistriatus provided in Talamas et al (2017). In a manner conforming with this perspective, our results have been confirmed by a concomitant study by Talamas et al (2019), in which a phylogeny of Trissolcus based on five molecular markers retrieved T. belenus, T. colemani and T. semistriatus as distinct entities.…”

Molecular Identification of Trissolcus japonicus, Parasitoid of the Brown Marmorated Stink Bug, by Species-Specific PCR

“…Candidate primers for specific identification of T. japonicus were designed based on 19 different partial CO1 sequences at the 5′ end of the CO1 locus. Criteria for selection of species used were that the species was either closely related to T. japonicus [ 30 ] or could be mistaken for T. japonicus by untrained technicians, especially in the mid-Atlantic US [ 31 ]. The species included T. japonicus , closely related Palearctic species Trissolcus corai Talamas, Trissolcus kozlovi Rjakovskij, Trissolcus plautiae (Watanabe), T. cultratus , and Nearctic species of the flavipes group including Trissolcus euschisti (Ashmead) [ 30 ].…”

“…Criteria for selection of species used were that the species was either closely related to T. japonicus [ 30 ] or could be mistaken for T. japonicus by untrained technicians, especially in the mid-Atlantic US [ 31 ]. The species included T. japonicus , closely related Palearctic species Trissolcus corai Talamas, Trissolcus kozlovi Rjakovskij, Trissolcus plautiae (Watanabe), T. cultratus , and Nearctic species of the flavipes group including Trissolcus euschisti (Ashmead) [ 30 ]. The list also included more distantly related taxa that may be visually mistaken for T. japonicus such as Telenomus podisi Ashmead, Platygastridae sp., Cerephronidae sp., and Encyrtidae sp.…”

“…An initial in silico analysis was conducted to assess the primers’ specificity against other common Trissolcus wasps that parasitize BMSB [ 30 , 45 ]. In this assay, we only selected species that we were not able to collect on sticky cards ( Table 2 ).…”

First report and integrated analysis of two native Trissolcus species utilizing Bagrada hilaris eggs in California

“…Searches were run for 1 million generations, in two independent runs, using default priors and the GTR+I+G substitution model that was selected using the Bayesian information criterion (BIC) in MEGA X. One sequence of Trissolcus thyantae Ashmead (GenBank MN615574.1) was specified as the outgroup based on the results of Talamas et al (2019). Because a network approach is well adapted to infer intraspecific genealogical relationships, a haplotype network was built for T. utahensis using TCS 1.21 (Clement et al 2000).…”