On the identification of a taxa collected from Egypt in the species sub- group andersoni: Morphological relationships with related species and molecular analysis of inter- and intra- specific variations ( Acari: Phytoseiidae)

Abstract

Morphological studies of the diagnostic characters of Amblyseius swirskii Athias-Henriot (original description) and A. enab El Badry (several new collections including the type locality) indicated close affinity between the two species. Among the Egyptian collections, little morphological variations have been observed except for setae Z1, S2, S4 and S5. Sequencing of a fragment of the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region (ITS1, ITS2 and 5.8S) of different samples from Egypt showed almost complete identity with Neoseiulus swirskii (= A. swirskii Accession number EU 310505). Other related species i.e. A. cucumeris (Oud.), N. andersoni (Chant) and N. fallacis (Garman) showed distant identity. The intraspecific variationswere great between the six samples of Egypt and mainly because of mutations (which could be due to error during replication or as a result of mutagens).