Systematics and biogeography of the widespread dragonfly genus Orthetrum (Odonata: Anisoptera: Libellulidae)

Dragonflies of the genus Orthetrum Newman, 1833 are members of the suborder Anisoptera in Libellulidae family, which is the biggest one of dragonflies world-wide (Manwar et al., 2012). The genus is exceptionally large and ranges widely across the old world (Watson et al. 1991). The genus of Orthetrum contains about 80 species worldwide regions over Afrotropical, Palearctic, Oriental, Madagascar, Oceania, Wallace, and Australasian (Dijkstra and Kalkman, 2012) of which more than 30 species occur in Afrotropic (Clausnitzer & Dijkstra 2014). This genus is characterized by; sectors of arculus in the fore wings with a differentiated merger before encounter arculus; bases of hind wings without blackish-brown markings; ever any accessesive cross-veins to the bridge (Fraser, 1936).

Although the genus Orthetrum is old, widely distributed across the world, we do not know their evolutionary history and where they originated from. As of now, there has not been any phylogenetic examination conducted to verify the monophyletic nature of Orthetrum or to establish species-groupings using clades and geographic ranges.

To address this gap, the current study aims to produce a large molecular dataset for Orthetrum phylogeny and classification. Utilizing anchored hybrid enrichment (AHE) data, the study encompasses a diverse taxon sample of 51 Orthetrum species and two outgroup taxa from the closely related Libellulidae family. This comprehensive approach aims to test the genus's monophyly and explore its historical biogeography for the first time.