Astria, Zhang & Cong & Shen & Song & Grishin, 2024

Zhang, Jing, Cong, Qian, Shen, Jinhui, Song, Leina & Grishin, Nick V., 2024, Taxonomic advances driven by the genomic analysis of butterflies, The Taxonomic Report of the International Lepidoptera Survey 11 (7), pp. 1-43 : 23-24

Astria Grishin , new subgenus

http://zoobank.org/ 132F96BD-9572-444E-A4F8-D2E0D21ED23B

Type species. Lycaena astraea Freyer, 1851 .

Definition. Nuclear genome phylogeny reveals that Glaucopsyche astraea (Freyer, 1851) (type locality in Turkey, syntype sequenced as NVG-22119A10) is sister to all other species of Glaucopsyche Scudder, 1872 (type species Polyommatus lygdamus E. Doubleday, 1841 ), including type species of all its subgenera and their available synonyms: Polyommatus lygdamus E. Doubleday, 1841 of Glaucopsyche Scudder, 1872 ; Lycaena catalina Reakirt, 1866 (a junior subjective synonym of Lycaena piasus Boisduval, 1852 ) of Phaedrotes Scudder, 1876 ; Polyommatus melanops Boisduval, 1828 of Apelles Hemming, 1931 ; Glaucopsyche ( Sinia) leechi Forster, 1940 of Sinia Forster, 1940; Lycaena barine Leech, 1893 (a subspecies of Lycaena divina Fixsen, 1887 ) of Shijimiaeoides Beuret, 1958 ; and Lycaena argali Elwes, 1899 of Bajluana Korshunov, 1990 ( Fig. 18a). We note that Phaedrotes (a subgenus of G. piasus ) that causes problems by rendering Glaucopsyche paraphyletic in trees inferred from a small number of gene markers, especially when using a larger fraction of positions from mitochondrial genes ( Nazari et al. 2024) or complete mitogenomes ( Fig. 18b), is closer related (with 100% statistical support) to the subgenus Glaucopsyche than G. astraea . In agreement with morphological considerations, Glaucopsyche is monophyletic in the nuclear genome tree, with G. astraea being its most divergent member. Therefore, G. astraea is not monophyletic with any described subgenera of Glaucopsyche and does not belong to any of them. Hence, its lineage represents a new subgenus. This new subgenus differs from its relatives by ventrally not darkened marginal area and submarginal spots in forewing cells M 3 -CuA 1 and CuA 1 -CuA 2 being closer to the margin than in other species and forming a line nearly parallel to the outer margin, while the other three spots of the band are in a straight line with each other and the 4 th spot (in cell M 3 - CuA 1), i.e., the spot nearest to costa is not offset from the rest. In DNA, a combination of the following characters is diagnostic in the nuclear genome: cce62262.1.1:A120T, cce62262.1.1:C123T, cce748.19.2: C39T, cce748.19.2:T78C, cce 2404.9.1:C165T and in COI barcode: A34T, A94T, T448C, T484C, T598C.

Etymology. The name of the type species likely refers to Astraea (Ἀστραῖα), a Greek goddess of justice, innocence, purity, and precision. A different spelling of this name ( Astria ) is taken as the genus name, which is a feminine noun in the nominative singular.

Species included. Only the type species (i.e., Lycaena astraea Freyer, 1851 ).

Parent taxon. Genus Glaucopsyche Scudder, 1872 .

Comment. Glaucopsyche is an example of confident incongruence between nuclear and mitochondrial genomes ( Fig. 18a vs. b) with subgenera Phaedrotes and Astria subgen. n. not being in the same clade as the rest of the genus in the mitogenomic tree, probably due to mitochondrial introgression. Further studies of this incongruence will shed light on the role of hybridization in speciation and adaptation.