The first DNA barcode of medically important cockroaches in Bangladesh

Cockroaches can spread various pathogenic agents which are accountable for food adulteration and the dispersing of foodborne pathogens. Pest management depends on proper identification. Nowadays, the COI gene of mitochondrial DNA has been anticipated as a recent systematic method functional in taxonomy and evolutionary study on species identification. The present research work is an initiative to identify the medically important cockroaches based on mitochondrial COI gene sequences. Eight (8) cockroach species (Periplaneta americana, Periplaneta brunnea, Periplaneta australasiae, Blatella germanica, Hebardina concinna, Pycnoscleus surinamensis, Blaberidae sp. and Balta notulata) were identified. Among them, four cockroach species (Balta notulata, Blaberidae sp., Hebardina Concinna and Pycnoscelus surinamensis) were the new record from Bangladesh. AT base content in DNA fragments of cockroaches was higher than GC base content. The highest AT content was 70% and the lowest GC content was 30%. The interspecific genetic divergence range of medically important cockroach species was 0.01-0.25. According to mutational steps, Pycnoscelus surinamensis was mostly diverged from its common ancestor by 88 mutational steps. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that species belonging to the same family were in the same major clade. This research is the first molecular approach to identify the medically important cockroach species based on MT-COI gene sequences in Bangladesh.