Unraveling population genetic structure of the big-headed ant in Asia-Pacific region

On-Demand

Presenting Author(s)

Kuan-Ling Liu

PhD student
Texas A&M University
College Station, Texas

Co-author(s)

Shu-Ping Tseng

Post doc
University of California
Riverside, California
HT

Haruki Tatsuta

University of the Ryukyus
Nishihara, Okinawa, Japan
KT

Kazuki Tsuji

University of the Ryukyus
Nishihara, Okinawa, Japan
Jia-Wei Tay

Assistant Professor
University of Hawai'i
Honolulu, Hawai'i
GS

G. Veera Singham

Universiti Sains Malaysia
Penang, Malaysia
CY

Chin-Cheng Yang

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
Blacksburg, Virginia

Co-Author(s)

KN

Kok-Boon Neoh

National Chung Hsing University
Taichung City, Taichung, Taiwan (Republic of China)

Spread of invasive species has been facilitated drastically with global commerce and transportation, thus catastrophically threatening global ecosystem. The African big-headed ant, Pheidole megacephala (Fabricius) is a global invasive ant species. Thus, we want to elucidate the population genetic structure in its invasive range by using Okinawa, Hawaii and Taiwan as the model. The population genetic structure in these three regions showed genetically similar. This could be linked to the geographical location and historical event in Asia-Pacific region. Also, we minimize the scale to look deep into Taiwan’s population. P. megacephala was first reported in Taiwan approximately 100 years ago. Despite the long establishment history of this species in Taiwan, invasion history and population structure of this species, however, remain understudied. In the present study, P. megacephala colonies were collected from four geographical regions. Multiple workers were genotyped using microsatellite loci, and our result showed that P. megacephala is characteristic of low genetic diversity across different regions in Taiwan. Low yet significant regional genetic differentiation and the presence of isolation by distance imply that long-distance jump dispersal may be relatively infrequent but local expansion plays an important role. We sequenced partial cytochrome oxidase I (COI) gene and found a total of three mitochondrial haplotypes (e.g., TW1-3). All haplotypes except TW2 most likely originate from populations in the species’ known invasive range, suggesting secondary introduction represents the prevailing introduction mode in this invasive ant.