MultipleWolbachia infections inRhagoletis pomonella

Rhagoletis pomonella Walsh (Diptera: Tephritidae) is a model species for sympatric speciation through host race formation on apple and hawthorn. The bacterial endosymbiont Wolbachia ,a manipulator of arthropod reproduction, has been considered to contribute to speciation in several species. A potential role of Wolbachia in sympatric speciation of R. pomonella remains to be tested despite an earlierdetectionbyPCR.Inthis study,weisolatedWolbachiafromR. pomonellaindividualsfrom both host species using multi-locussequence typing (MLST) and the surface protein wsp.By cloning and sequencing of 311 plasmids, we found sequence types of at least four wPom strains. A complete MLST profile was obtained only for wPom1, whereas MLST loci of the other putative strainsweredifficulttoassignbecauseofmultipleinfectionsandlowsamplenumbers.wPom1occurs in both host races, whereas different sequence types were found at low frequencies only in appleinfesting R. pomonella. This warrants further investigation as it cannot be excluded that Wolbachia playsa partinthis modelofsympatricspeciation.