Wolbachia infections and mitochondrial diversity of two chestnut feeding Cydia species.

Abstract

Cydia splendana and C. fagiglandana are two closely related chestnut feeding lepidopteran moth species. In this study, we surveyed the bacterial endosymbiont Wolbachia in these two species. Infection rates were 31% in C. splendana and 77% in C. fagiglandana. MLST analysis showed that these two species are infected with two quite diverse Wolbachia strains. C. splendana with Sequence Type (ST) 409 from the A-supergroup and C. fagiglandana with ST 150 from the B-supergroup. One individual of C. splendana was infected with ST 150, indicating horizontal transfer between these sister species. The mitochondrial DNA of the two Cydia species showed a significantly different mtDNA diversity, which was inversely proportional to their infection rates.