Late Pleistocene environmental changes lead to unstable demography and population divergence of Anopheles albimanus in the northern Neotropics

Abstract: We investigated the historical demography of Anopheles albimanus using mosquitoes from five countries and three different DNA regions, the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit I gene (COI), the single copy nuclear white gene and the ribosomal internal transcribed spacer two (ITS2). All the molecular markers supported the taxonomic status of a single species of An. albimanus. Furthermore, agreement between the COI and the white genes suggested a scenario of Pleistocene geographic fragmentation (i.e., population contraction) and subsequent range expansion across southern Central America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]