ARPHA Preprints, doi: 10.3897/arphapreprints.e118321
Complete mitochondrial genome of Plecia longiforceps Duda, 1933 (Diptera, Bibionidae) and its implications for the evolution of mass outbreaks in flies
expand article infoSeunghun Jung, Sangil Kim§|, Seunggwan Shin§
‡ School of Biological Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul, Republic of Korea§ Research Institute of Basic Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul, Republic of Korea| Museum of Comparative Zoology and Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, United States of America
Open Access
Abstract

Over the past decade, the prevalence of mass outbreaks involving non-native insects has sparked concerns about their potential negative impact on human inhabited areas and local environments. Plecia longiforceps Duda, 1933 (Diptera, Bibionidae) was recently recognized as an invasive pest in South Korea, causing public nuisance through mass outbreaks in the Seoul Metropolitan Area during early summer. In this study, we present the first complete mitochondrial genome of Plecia longiforceps, generated from the PacBio HiFi long-read sequencing data. Notably, the length of the circular genome is found to be larger than any annotated reference sequences of mitochondrial genomes for the infraorder Bibionomorpha, which is attributable to an unusually long A+T rich control region. We conducted a phylogenetic analysis of Bibionomorpha, leveraging all mitochondrial genome data sequenced to date, to elucidate relationships among genera within Bibionidae. Our resulting phylogeny of Bibionomorpha recovered a strong monophyly of the family Bibionidae and its three subfamilies: Bibioninae (Bibio + Dilophus), Hesperininae (Hesperinus + Penthetria), and Pleciinae (Plecia), corroborating the recently proposed taxonomic classification system of Bibionidae. Furthermore, we discuss evolutionary trends within Bibionidae based on our well-supported higher relationships of the superfamily Bibionoidea.

Keywords
Bibionomorpha, Bibionidae, long-read sequencing, mitochondrial genome, phylogeny, Plecia longiforceps