Cytotaxonomical examination for sibling species in the taxon Anopheles culicifacies Giles in Sri Lanka.

Ovarian polytene chromosomes of Anopheles culicifacies collected from different climatic and eco-epidemiological localities were examined to study the composition and distribution of sibling species in Sri Lanka. During the study period 4328 ovaries were prepared for examination, of which 1937 were suitable for the reading of polytene chromosomes. Among these 458 specimens were identified as belonging to species B based on diagnostic inversion on x-chromosome and 1479 definitively were identified as sibling species B on the basis of x-chromosome and chromosome arm-2 inversion. Other sibling species were not encountered among the specimens identified from 31 Health Areas during the study period. The occurrence of sibling species B of An. culicifacies in Sri Lanka is confirmed but no evidence of other sibling species (A, C or D) was found.