The determination of chromosome number of trombidioidea mite species

To date, no study has been conducted on the chromosome numbers of the Trombidioidea superfamily. In this study, three taxa of trombidioid mites, which have been studied morphologically and taxonomically, but not cytologically, were examined, their chromosome numbers, monoploid idiograms and chromosomal measurements were made. For this, samples of Trombidium holosericeum, Trombidium latum and Eutrombidium trigonum species collected both from alcohol and from the field were used. A total of 32 individuals were used in the study and different life stages were tried in order to find out which life stage the best chromosomes would be seen. The cytogenetic protocol modified by Imai et al. (1988) and Gokhman Quicke (1995) was used as a method for this study. This was found to be 2n=12 for T. holosericeum, 2n=12 for T. latum and 2n=14 for E. trigonum. T. holosericeum has a total haploid chromosome length of 8.31 μm, an average chromosome length of 1.38 μm, a total haploid chromosome length of 7.13 μm for T. latum, an average chromosome length of 1.18 μm, and a total haploid chromosome length of 6.35 μm, an average chromosome length of 0.9 μm for E. trigonum. Chromosome lengths of T. holosericeum vary between 1.05-1.92 μm, T. latum between 0.76-1.71 μm and E. trigonum between 0.68-1.40 μm. Based on the data, it was concluded that T. holosericeum and T. latum may be sibling species. Keywords: Acari, Chromosome, Eutrombidium, Trombidium, Velvet acari