Aleiodes mubfsi Quicke & Shaw, 2006

Quicke, Donald L. J., Mori, Miharu, Riverón, Alejandro Zaldivar-, Laurenne, Nina M. & Shaw, Mark R., 2006, Suspended mummies in Aleiodes species (Hymenoptera: Braconidae: Rogadinae) with descriptions of six new species from western Uganda based largely on DNA sequence data, Journal of Natural History 40 (47 - 48), pp. 2663-2680 : 2675

Aleiodes mubfsi Quicke & Shaw , sp. n.

Material examined

Holotype: Female, Uganda, Kibale Forest National Park, Kanyawara , viii-2002, reared from mummified, suspended geometrid larva ( NMS)

Description

Length of body 4.5 mm, of fore wing 3.5mm. Antenna with 38 segments.

As for A. barnardae sp. n. except for colour. Pterostigma largely pale. Metasomal tergites largely pale ochreous yellow, tergite 1 postero-medially, tergite 2 broadly medially and tergite 3 with a small anteromedial area rather more yellow-white.

Molecular features

Displays two unique substitutions in the 28S D2 region (corresponding to positions 107 and 199 of the alignment presented by Belshaw et al. (1998; Figure 1 , loc. cit.). The indel regions of the ITS2 gene were hard to read in the only known specimen, possibly due to intragenomic polymorphism; however, the sequence displays a unique base substitution (see Figure 5 , upper panel).

Etymology

Named after the adapted acronym of the Makerere University Biological Field Station ( MUBFS) at Kanyawara.

Figures

Figure 1. Photograph of a suspended mummy showing J-shaped configuration with silk thread (arrowed) arising near larval mouth.

Figure 5. Two fragments of the ITS2 region aligned by eye showing marked differences between species in the Aleiodes buzurae-group. Asterisks and bold font indicate substitutions in length-conserved regions and lines show regions of length variation. Xs indicate uncertainty about number and identity of bases.