The Complete Mitochondrial Genome of Northeast Asian Rove Beetle, <i>Lordithon arcuatus</i> (Solsky, 1871) and Performance of Site-Specific Mixture Models in Building the Mitogenomic Phylogeny of Staphylinidae (Insecta: Coleoptera)

Abstract

Lordithon species are typically mushroom-dwelling rove beetles that devour maggots. This study presents the mitogenome of a Lordithon arcuatus specimen that was procured from Changbai Mountain in the Jilin Province of China. The mitogenome is 18,290 bp long and comprises 13 protein-coding genes, 22 tRNAs, and 2 rRNAs. The base composition of the mitogenome is as follows: A = 38.80%, T = 37.93%, G = 8.94%, and C = 14.32%. Maximum likelihood and Bayesian phylogenetic trees were constructed using 68 representative staphylinid species, which showed that Lordithon, Bolitobius, and Ischnosoma form a stable and fully supported Mycetoporinae clade, whereas there was no consensus regarding the relationships among Tachyporinae taxa. Additionally, the performance of site-specific mixture models for inferring the phylogeny of staphylinids using mitogenomic data was assessed. The results suggest that heterotachy models should be used with caution, as they may result in incorrect topology with delusive precedence in AIC- or BIC-based model selection.

Keywords

• mitogenome
• phylogenetics
• heterogeneity models
• rove beetles
• Mycetoporinae
• <i>Lordithon</i>