Phylogenetic Relationship of Subterranean Termite (Blattodea: Rhinotermitidae) Inhabiting Urban and Natural Habitats

Overview

Journal Heliyon

Specialty Social Sciences

Date 2024 Jan 9

PMID 38192757

Authors

Naveeta M Vellupillai

Abdul Hafiz Ab Majid

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

termites were collected from forestry habitats at University Sains Malaysia, Penang, while urban samples were collected from residentials from Penang and Kedah, Malaysia. Mitochondrial DNA markers, Cytochrome Oxidase 1 (CO1), and 16S ribosomal RNA (16S rRNA) genes were amplified and sequenced to confirm the species of the termite samples as . Through Blastn, all 25 CO1 and 16S rRNA sequences, respectively from urban and natural habitats were found to be 99.54-100.00 % similar to reference sequences from previous studies in Peninsular Malaysia. The phylogenetic trees constructed using Neighboring-joining (NJ) and Maximum Likelihood (ML) methods resulted in CO1 sequences clustering in two clades and 16S rRNA sequences clustering in a single clade. The overall mean distance was low for the populations from natural habitats and urban settings (F = 0.004). Analysis of natural habitat populations using CO1 sequences revealed two haplotypes within the population, with a haplotype diversity (Hd) of 0.045 ± 0.005, while the urban population shared a common haplotype with the natural habitat populations and there was no haplotype diversity recorded between the populations. Urban and natural habitats included only one haplotype for 16S rRNA sequences, indicating a lack of nucleotide diversity. Based on the findings, a non-significant difference between the natural habitat and urban population suggests inhabiting both regions likely originated from a similar source and underwent population homogeneity in different settings facilitated by anthropogenic dispersal.

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