Cytotaxonomy of triatomines: The cytogenic as a tool in the study of Triatoma brasiliensis complex and of Brasiliensis subcomplex

Abstract

The triatomines belong to the Hemiptera Order, Heteroptera Suborder, Reduviidae Family and Triatominae Subfamily. Specific identification and systematic triatomines have been based primarily on morphological observations, mainly by light microscopy. Schofield and Galvão, in 2009, proposed a classification of these organisms in specific subcomplexes and to group them, using mainly the geographical and morphological characters as parameters. The Brasiliensis subcomplex consists of nine species: Triatoma brasiliensis, T. juazeirensis, T. melanica, T melanocephala, T. petrochiae, T. lenti, T. sherlocki, T. tibiamaculata and T. vitticeps. Costa and colleagues, through the analysis of different aspects, such as morphological, biological, isozyme and ecological, ranked the subspecies T. b. brasiliensis and T. b. macromelanosoma and species, T. juazeirensis and T. melanica the T. brasiliensis complex. In 2009, through mitochondrial DNA phylogenetic reconstruction was proposed to recent inclusion T. sherlocki the complex. Thus, this paper describes cytogenetically the species T. lenti, T. sherlocki, experimental hybrids (F1) and (F2) produced from a cross between T. and T. lenti sherlocki, T. melanocephala and T. vitticeps, with the aim of evaluating cytotaxonomic the current classification of these organisms morphologically related. Moreover, we will compare the cytogenetic characteristics of these organisms with triatomines belonging to T. brasiliensis complex and Brasiliensis subcomplex, to provide an additional tool in the classification problem involved in these organisms.