Appropriate management of invasive fungi requires adequate understanding of their global diversities and movement histories. The fungus Leptographium procerum is associated with root-colonizing forest insects in pine forests throughout the world, and may have contributed to the aggressive behaviour of the red turpentine beetle (Dendroctonus valens) in the beetle's invasive range in China. We used microsatellites and mating type loci to investigate the global diversity of L. procerum and the source population of L. procerum associated with D. valens in China. Clustering analyses supported the separation of the fungal data set into three genetically and geographically-distinct clusters: Europe, North America, and China. The fungus had the highest genetic diversity in Europe, followed by North America and China. Analyses using Approximate Bayesian Computation supported Europe as the most likely source of the North American and Chinese populations. Overall, the results suggested that Europe is the global centre of diversity of L. procerum. Furthermore, they suggested that L. procerum most likely arrived in China independently of D. valens and adopted this beetle as a vector after its introduction.
Keywords: Dendroctonus valens; Forestry; Invasion biology; Ophiostomatoid fungus; Symbiosis.
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