Genetic diversity of six isolated populations of the leopard moth, Zeuzera pyrina (Lep: Zeuzeridae)

摘要

The leopard moth, Zeuzera pyrina (Lep: Zeuzeridae), is an important pest of a wide range of trees and shrubsincluding walnut and apple across the world. The natural populations of the leopard moth in differentgeographical areas of Iran show significant differences in some of their biological characteristics such as timeof emergence, generation time and host specificity. So, we hypothesized that these populations may representdifferent subspecies that move toward a speciation event in their evolutionary route. In this study, we evaluatedthe genetic diversity of six different geographically isolated populations of the leopard moth using thesequence alignment of cytochrome oxidase c subunit one (COI). A fragment of 642 base pairs was amplified inall six populations and the phylogenetic tree was created based on sequenced fragments. Our results revealedsignificant differences in the nucleotide sequence of COI gene in these populations. Differences in climaticconditions of these regions seem to be the most powerful force driving this diversity among the studiedpopulations.