AUTHOR=An Yuxin , Li Cong , Li Jing , Wang Yuyu 

TITLE=The complete mitochondrial genome of Simulium jisigouense (Diptera: Simuliidae) and phylogenetic analysis of Simuliidae

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution

VOLUME=10

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/ecology-and-evolution/articles/10.3389/fevo.2022.932601

DOI=10.3389/fevo.2022.932601

ISSN=2296-701X

ABSTRACT=<p>The family Simuliidae belongs to Diptera whose systematic position is still strongly debated. A few mitochondrial genomes (mitogenomes) of Simuliidae and none of the subgenus <italic>Montisimulium</italic> in the genus <italic>Simulium</italic> have previously been available. Therefore, the mitogenome of <italic>Simulium jisigouense</italic> Chen, Zhang and Liu, 2008 was sequenced to better understand the diversity of mitogenomes within this family. The complete mitogenome of <italic>S. jisigouense</italic> was 16,384 bp long. It contained 37 genes including 22 tRNAs, 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs), and 2 rRNAs, and an A + T-rich region, which was the same as the arrangement of mitogenomes of ancestral insects. Almost all PCGs used the typical ATN as start codons, except <italic>COI</italic> used TTG. Almost all tRNAs could be folded into cloverleaf structures except the dihydrouridine (DHU) arm of <italic>tRNA<sup>Ser</sup></italic><sup>(</sup><italic><sup>AGN</sup></italic><sup>)</sup>, which formed a loop. The phylogenetic analysis revealed that Simuliidae was monophyletic and was the sister group to Thaumaleidae. Subgenus <italic>Simulium</italic> was recovered as paraphyletic and needs more comprehensive sampling in future studies. Divergence time estimation showed that Simuliidae diverged from Thaumaleidae at 239.24 Ma and the subgenera of <italic>Simulium</italic> diverged from each other from 162.46 to 75.08 Ma.</p>