Characterization of the complete mitochondrial genome of tea tussock moth, Euproctis pseudoconspersa (Lepidoptera: Lymantriidae) and its phylogenetic implications

• The complete mitogenome of E. pseudoconspersa is sequenced and described.
• Lymantriidae is more closely related to Erebidae than to Noctuidae.
• Lymantriidae lineage is raised here to family level.

In present work, we described the mitochondrial genome (mitogenome) of the tea tussock moth Euproctis pseudoconspersa (Lepidoptera: Lymantriidae). The complete mitogenome of E. pseudoconspersa is a circular genome 15,461 bp in size. It contains 37 genes and an A + T-rich region usually presented in lepidopteran mitogenomes, which genes share a lot of features with other known lepidopteran mitogenomes. Nucleotide composition of A + T in this mitogenome is 79.92%, and the AT skew is slightly positive. Both codon distribution and relative synonymous codon usage of the 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs) are consistent with those published lepidopteran sequences. All tRNA genes have typical cloverleaf secondary structures, except for the tRNASer(AGN), in which the dihydrouridine (DHU) arm is simplified down to a loop. The A + T-rich region of E. pseudoconspersa mitogenome possess the motif ‘ATAGA’ and poly-T stretch as the formerly identified conserved elements of Lepidoptera mitogenomes. The phylogenetic relationships were reconstructed by using maximum likelihood (ML) and Bayesian inference (BI) methods based on nucleotide sequences of 13 PCGs of 38 moths. The results were very consistent with the traditional relationships within Noctuoidea from morphological data, and showed that Lymantriidae is more closely related to Erebidae than to Noctuidae.