Phylogeographical study of the Formosan subterranean termite and the Asian subterranean termite in Taiwan by using mitochondrial DNA sequences (Isoptera: Rhinotermitidae)

The Formosan subterranean termite, Coptotermes formosanus Shiraki, is primarily found in the subtropical and temperate regions while the Asian subterranean termite, C. gestroi (Wasmann), is found in many areas of the tropics and subtropics. Taiwan is one of few areas where the distribution of the two species overlap. The overlapped zone is the low land areas from middle to south of Taiwan between 22-24°N. By analyzing sequences of COII gene, 12S rRNA gene, and 16S rRNA gene, we found most Taiwanese C. formosanus populations are closely related to Japanese and some Chinese populations, and the Taiwanese C. gestroi populations are closely related to those from the Philippines and Hawaii rather than populations from Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. The intraspecies variation of C. formosanus is 0.7-0.8% among seven Taiwanese populations while all Taiwanese C. gestroi populations have identical sequences. The result supports that Taiwan is one of the endemic areas for C. formosanus, but an introduced area for C. gestroi in recent event.