Iranian Trichogramma: ITS2 DNA characterization and natural Wolbachia infection

Egg parasitoids of the genus (Hymenoptera: Trichogrammatidae) are important natural enemies of many lepidopterous pests in agricultural and forest areas. Because the use of indigenous populations/species can significantly increase the biological control efficiency, the characterization of endemic populations and precise species identification is important. In this study, wasps were collected from parasitized eggs of several lepidopteran pests in Northern and Central Iran. Seven species were identified based on the morphology and the nucleotide sequence, size and restriction profile (PCR-RFLP) of the internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) region of the rDNA of . Bezdenko, Marchal, Hartig, Westwood, Girault, Voegel, and Sorokina. This is the first report of in Iran. Additionally, natural populations were surveyed for the prevalence of . Two populations of were found to be infected by a single strain which was identified by using a multi-locus sequencing approach.Egg parasitoids of the genus (Hymenoptera: Trichogrammatidae) are important natural enemies of many lepidopterous pests in agricultural and forest areas. Because the use of indigenous populations/species can significantly increase the biological control efficiency, the characterization of endemic populations and precise species identification is important. In this study, wasps were collected from parasitized eggs of several lepidopteran pests in Northern and Central Iran. Seven species were identified based on the morphology and the nucleotide sequence, size and restriction profile (PCR-RFLP) of the internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) region of the rDNA of . Bezdenko, Marchal, Hartig, Westwood, Girault, Voegel, and Sorokina. This is the first report of in Iran. Additionally, natural populations were surveyed for the prevalence of . Two populations of were found to be infected by a single strain which was identified by using a multi-locus sequencing approach.A