Abstract
The comprehensive analysis of five identified and two unknown termite species with their binary scores of three markers viz., morphological, ISSR scoring and 28s rDNA sequence has been made to reveal in unweighted pair group method with arithmetic mean (UPGMA) cluster that Trinervitermes biformis (Wasmann) is out grouped with 35.7% of dissimilarity with other species; Odontotermes obesus (Rambur) and Odontotermes redemanni (Wasmann) share same cluster with 32.7% of dissimilarity; similarly Odontotermes ceylonicus (Wasmann) and Odontotermes horni (Wasmann) share a maximum of 32.5% of dissimilarity. The UNKNOWN01 had more similarity with O. obesus (Rambur) and O. obesus (Rambur) in turn showed high similarity with that of O. redemanni (Wasmann). UNKNOWN02 was found along with O. ceylonicus (Wasmann) and O. horni (Wasmann). The study imparts cumulative or comprehensive analysis using different markers such as morphological, ISSR and nuclear genes like 28s rDNA that depict accurate measures of genetic diversity among different species of termites. Key words: Termite diversity, Odontotermes, Trinervitermes, inter simple sequence repeat (ISSR), 28s rDNA, unweighted pair group method with arithmetic mean (UPGMA), multiple sequence analysis.
Highlights
Termites are a well-known eusocial group of hemimetabolous insects classified under the taxonomic rank of infraorder Isoptera
Highest similarity coefficient value (0.404) was recorded between UNKNOWN02 and O. ceylonicus (Wasmann). These values specify that genetic similarity between the samples is very low and the diversity is very high with respect to the repetitive sequences in the genome
The repetitive DNA sequences can be used to produce species specific markers, which aids in robust detection of termite species
Summary
Termites are a well-known eusocial group of hemimetabolous insects classified under the taxonomic rank of infraorder Isoptera. Approximately 4000 living and many fossil, termite species are recognized and classified into 12 families. Termitidae being the largest family contains 14 subfamilies, 280 genera and over 2600 species (Kambhampati and Eggleton, 2000; Eggleton, 2001; Ohkuma et al, 2004; Krishna et al, 2013). Termites mostly feed on dead plant material for its cellulose content, generally in the form of wood, leaf litter on soil and animal dung. It is important to note that only about 10% of the estimated 4,000 species are considered as pests (Krishna et al, 2013; Bechly, 2007; Eggleton, 2010).
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