Abstract: This study is the first attempt to combine gene sequences with morphological characters to provide a phylogenetic reconstruction of the subfamily Doryctinae (Insecta: Hymenoptera: Braconidae). Eighteen species belonging to 6 tribes 15 genera of the subfamily were involved, and 11 species of 11 genera belonging to 7 subfamilies of Braconidae were used as outgroups with Microgasterinae (Cotesia flavipes) used as “root” to testify the monophyletic nature of the subfamily. The DNA sequences of D2 region of 28S ribosomal DNA were downloaded from the GenBank. One hundred characters of morphology and anatomy were selected and analyzed in a cladistic manner for this study. The evolutionary relationships were investigated by comparing the results from molecular data alone or molecular data combined morphological characters, using two different analysis methods: maximum parsimony (MP) by PAUP* 4.0 and Bayesian inference by MrBayes 3.0B4. Base composition and ti/tv of 28S rDNA D2 regions were analyzed by PAUP* 4.0. The results showed that GC content of the 28S rDNA D2 gene sequences of subfamily Doryctinae ranged from 39.33% to 48.28%. Transversion frequency of sequence variable sites among species of Doryctinae was higher than that of transition. The subfamily Doryctinae was proved to be a well-defined naturally monophyletic group; within the subfamily, evidences were found to support that only tribe Siragrini was monophyletic group, and the other tribes, tribe Doryctini and tribe Hecabolini, were paraphyletic groups. There was no consistency between the topologies of phylogenetic trees generated by different analysis methods with different data, in accordance with the results of morphological and biological research of the subfamily, suggesting that more work should be done to resolve the phylogenetic relationships among genera and tribes of the subfamily Doryctinae.

Key words: Braconidae, Dorycinae, Phylogeny, 28S rDNA D2, morphological characters