The wheat curl mite Aceria tosichella (Acari: Eriophyoidea) is a complex of cryptic lineages with divergent host ranges: evidence from molecular and plant bioassay data

Aceria tosichella (the wheat curl mite, WCM) is a global pest of wheat and other cereals, causing losses by direct damage, as well as the transmission of plant viruses. The mite is considered to have an unusually wide host range for an eriophyoid species. The present study tested the commonly held assumption that WCM is a single, highly polyphagous species by assessing the host range of genetically distinct lineages of WCM occurring in Poland on different host plants. Genotyping was performed by analyzing nucleotide sequence data from fragments of the mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI) and the nuclear D2 region of 28S rDNA. Mean between-lineage distance estimated using COI data was found to be one order of magnitude greater than the within-clade lineage and, in some cases, comparable to distances between WCM lineages and a congeneric outgroup species. Host acceptance was tested by quantifying population growth for different WCM mitochondrial (mt)DNA lineages when transfe...