Karyotypic assignment of Sri Lankan Anopheles culicifacies species B and e does not correlate with cytochrome oxidase subunit i and microsatellite genotypes

Background: the identification of species b and e in the anopheles culicifacies complex in the indian subcontinent has been based on y-chromosome karyotype. since no detectable variations were previously found in dna markers commonly used for sibling species identification,further molecular characterization using cytochrome oxidase subunit i (coi) and microsatellite markers was carried out on y-chromosome karyotyped anopheles culicifacies specie b and e from unnichchai,kallady and ranawarunawa in sri lanka. findings: coi sequence analysis (n∈=∈22) revealed the presence of nine unique haplotypes with six in each species. three haplotypes were shared by both species. the two sibling species had a pairwise fst value of 1.338 (p∈<∈0.05) with the number of migrants (nm) value <1. the genetic structure analysis resulted in two genetic clusters not 100 % associated with karyotypes. while none of the species b were incorrectly assigned two were inconclusive. five out of 26 specimens karyotyped as species e were incorrectly assigned,while further 9 were inconclusive. conclusions: the new molecular data support the existence of two genetically different populations of the culicifacies complex in sri lanka that are not associated with the y-chromosome karyotype. detailed analysis with more microsatellite markers and assortative mating experiments are needed to establish the presence of the two genetically distinct populations and relate them to y-chromosome morphology. © 2015 surendran et al.