Complete Mitochondrial Genome Analyses of Forcipomyia pulchrithorax (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae): Genome Orientation and Phylogenetic Implications.

Forcipomyia Meigen, 1818, is the second-largest genus of the family Ceratopogonidae, having medico veterinary and agricultural importance. A few mitogenomes of Ceratopogonidae have previously been available. Here, we aimed to characterize the whole mitogenome of Forcipomyia pulchrithorax Edwards, 1924, collected from Central Anatolia Region of the Türkiye using NGS to contribute to the genetic diversity within this family. The mitogenome of F. pulchrithorax (OR666457) consisted of a circular DNA molecule spanning 15,930 bp and containing 72.7% AT content. It includes 13 proteincoding genes (PCGs), 22 transfer RNA (tRNA) genes, 2 ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes, and 1 control region. All PCGs exhibited typical ATN start codons and followed the conventional TAN stop codons, except COX1, COX2, COX3, ND1, and ND5, which ended with incomplete codons. The 22 tRNA genes demonstrated the ability to form a cloverleaf structure, except tRNA-Ser1, which lacked DHU arm, similar to most insect mitogenomes. The ML phylogenetic analyses clearly delineated the species of Culicomorpha into well supported monophyletic clades. Forcipomyia pulchrithorax was clustered with the Ceratopogonidae species constituting an outer taxon among the Culicomorpha. The comprehensive mitogenome of F. pulchrithorax will be valuable for future studies focused on the phylogenetic characterization and diversity of Ceratopogonidae within the Culicomorpha. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]