DNA barcodes and new primers for nature's pest controllers: the social wasps.
Globally, biodiversity is declining because of anthropogenic pressures, and this could lead to extinction of some species before they are discovered. The loss of insect taxa is of prime concern, given recent reports of significant declines in the populations of many taxa across the globe. Efforts to document biodiversity have met with several challenges, amongst which are the difficulties in using morphological features to discriminate species, especially in insects. DNA barcoding is a rapid and reliable method for species identification and discovery but choosing appropriate primers to amplify the barcode region without co-amplifying contaminants remains a key challenge. We developed and tested a set of primers for PCR amplification of the DNA barcode region of the COI gene in polistine wasps. We tested their efficacy in 36 species of vespid wasps, and the solitary wasp Zethus miniatus Saussure. Samples were obtained from Africa, Americas, Asia, and Europe. The polistine-specific primers successfully amplified the barcode region for all polistines tested, without amplifying any Wolbachia present; they also worked with many species from the other Vespidae wasp subfamilies. The new primers are valuable for the discovery and accurate documentation of polistine wasps in the four continents.
['Onah|Ikechukwu Eugene|IE|', 'Sumner|Seirian|S|']
D000818:Animals D044822:Biodiversity D004247:DNA D058893:DNA Barcoding, Taxonomic D017931:DNA Primers D007313:Insecta D010571:Pest Control D010802:Phylogeny D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction D014863:Wasps
DNA barcoding social wasps COI gene Vespidae codage à barres de l’ADN guêpes sociales gène COI