Yuting Ding, Gaoji Zhang, Hongyi Liu
The order Scorpiones represents a lineage of arachnids that has exhibited considerable evolutionary success, encompassing over 1700 recognized species. However, the mitogenomes within this group have received limited attention. To increase the taxonomic sampling of species available for studies based on mitogenomes, we reconstructed the complete mitogenome of Androctonus crassicauda Olivier, 1807 (Scorpiones, Buthidae). The specimen was obtained from insect markets in Nanjing, Jiangsu, China. The mitogenome is a circular molecule with a length of 14,834 bp. The proportion of adenine and thymine (A + T) was 67.3%. The Ka/Ks ratios for all protein-coding genes (PCGs) were determined to be less than 1, implying that purifying selection likely plays a dominant role in shaping the evolutionary patterns of these genes. The frequency of codons ending in A/U was significantly higher than that of codons ending in C/G, reflecting the strong AT bias of the third codon position. Phylogenetic analyses based on PCGs corroborated previously recognized taxonomic relationships in family Buthidae. These findings enhance our understanding of the evolution of Buthidae mitogenomes.