Sequence differentiation among inversion rearrangement are revealed by random amplified polymorphic DNA markers in the grasshopper Trimerotropis pallidipennis (Orthoptera: Acrididae:Oedipodinae)

CONFALONIERI, VIVIANA ANDREA; SCATAGLINI, MARÍA AMALIA; REMIS, MARÍA ISABEL

Annals of the Entomological Society of America

Entomological Society of America

Lugar: Hawaii, USA.; Año: 2002 vol. 95 p. 201 - 207

0013-8746

South American populations of Trimerotropis pallidipennis Burmeister are polymorphic for pericentric inversions. In this species rearrangement frequencies follow repetitive patterns of distributions along different geographic areas, which are determined by altitude, minimum temperature and humidity variables. The present paper reports the analysis of random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPDs) in five populations of T. pallidipennis and shows the possible relationships of this kind of molecular variability with inversion and enzyme polymorphisms. Both comparisons of RAPDs vs. Chromosome and RAPDs vs. Enzyme genetic distances yielded significant results, indicating that the degree of differentiation between pairs of populations is significantly similar when all three types of variability are compared with each other. Specially, the differentiation for loci amplified by some of the primers is significatively correlated with the differentiation in humidity conditions. Therefore, RAPD loci frequencies tend to follow similar patterns of variations as chromosome and enzymatic variability. Inversions are of evolutionary significance because they can generate supergenes that preserve special genetic sequences. A population of T. pallidipennis at high altitudes, which is monomorphic for basic sequences at all chromosomes, will not have the same allele sequence as a population at low altitudes with fixed inverted chromosomes. As all seven inversions involve a good portion of the genome, the variation between supergenes that differentiate populations are expected to be observed when many random fragments of DNA are amplified, since an eventual recognition sequence of the primers sited into the inversion may be altered. The significance of the congruence between enzymatic and RAPD variability is also discussed.