Butterfly Genetics

[Pete Eeles]

I'm in the process of writing up some basic information on variation (that will become an article on the website at some point - and not before a review by Felix!).

One question I have - does anyone have any good sources that specify the number of chromosomes found in various species of Lepidoptera?

Thx in advance.

Cheers

- Pete

[Lee Hurrell]

Hi Pete,

I think Tolman states the numbers for selected European species where indentification can be difficult, contentious specification has been described or interbreeding occurs.

I can't double check as I'm away and don't have it with me.

Cheers

Lee

[Michaeljf]

I don't know if these article are any good, but they are certainly are scientific.

http://nar.oxfordjournals.org/content/3 ... /D582.full

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2867904/

From the Genetics article:

Lepidoptera chromosome numbers range from n = 7 to n = 220; however, n = 29–31 is most common. There are far more species with <29 chromosomes than there are with >31, suggesting that chromosomal fusions have been more frequent and evolutionarily successful than fissions through time (WHITE 1973). However, even within Heliconius there is variation in chromosome number; for example, H. sapho has a large number of small chromosomes (n = 56–57; BROWN et al. 1992). Thus, the anchor loci identified here would likely be of limited use in identifying conserved chromosomal linkage groups in H. sapho, and it remains an open question as to why certain species have undergone very rapid chromosomal evolution against a background of considerable stability.

Apologies if what you're after is more specific than this.

Michael

[Pete Eeles]

Thx both - I'll have a closer look when I get a mo.

Cheers

- Pete