PHYLOGENETIC STATUS OF RICE DARK HEADED STEMBORER, CHILO POLYCHRYSUS

Author(s): Mashhoor K.*, Ramesh N., Lazar K.V. and Shanas S.

Abstract: Generally, stemborers were considerd as the most serious pest of the paddy. The stemborer larvae enter to the tiller and feed inside, which leads to characteristics damage symptoms of ‘dead hearts’ or ‘white ears. Five pyralid rice stem borer species were reported from India and the phylogenetic relationship of them was not yet studied in detail. In this study we have determined the phylogenetic status of rice dark headed stemborer Chilo polychrysus using Cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) partial coding sequence. The COI sequence of C. polychrysus showed 9%, 10 and 13% divergence with stem-borers viz. C. suppressalis, Scirpophaga excerptalis and Scirpophaga innotata respectively. Interestingly it showed only 6-8% divergence with many species of different genus of Lepidotera family. Phylogenetically Lampides boeticus, Maculinea ario, Oleria olerioides, Oleria fumata, Greta andromica and Pseudoscada florula are the nearest relative of C. polychrysus. In the phylogeny tree the C. polychrysus and C. suppressalis were not aligned in a same clad. Therefore, further studies are needed to determine the taxonomic position of C. polychrysus.

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