Establishment of Genetic Distance of Different strains of Euploea core

The present study investigates the genetic distance among different strainsof Euploea core (commonly known as the Common Crow butterfly), aprominent member of the family Nymphalidae and widely distributed acrossIndia and Southeast Asia. The objective was to assess the genetic variationand evolutionary relationships between geographically separatedpopulations using mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI) genesequences as a DNA barcode. Specimens were collected from various Indianstates, including Jharkhand, Maharashtra, and Karnataka, along withcomparative sequences from regions such as Bangladesh and Malaysia.DNA was extracted, amplified, and sequenced, and the resulting data weresubjected to BLASTn analysis, multiple sequence alignment (MSA), andphylogenetic tree construction using Maximum Likelihood, MinimumEvolution, and Neighbor-Joining methods. A genetic distance matrix wasgenerated using the Kimura 2-parameter model in MEGA 12, with bootstrapvalues calculated from 1,000 replicates to ensure statistical confidence.The results revealed that sequences from the same or nearby geographicalregions showed negligible to very low genetic divergence (0.000–0.050),suggesting strong genetic homogeneity and ongoing gene flow. In contrast,higher levels of divergence (up to >0.18) were observed between strainsfrom distant regions such as Jharkhand and Bangladesh, indicating longtermseparation or the emergence of genetically structured populations. Themultiple phylogenetic methods consistently grouped the strains according totheir geographic origin, confirming regional genetic clustering. Thesefindings support the hypothesis that geographic and ecological barriers playa significant role in shaping genetic diversity within Euploea corepopulations.