Two new species and three new records of Cuprininae (Lepidoptera, Stathmopodidae) from Jeju Island, Korea, with molecular evidence for their placement

Cuprininae is a distinctive subfamily within Stathmopodidae whose larvae feed exclusively on fern spores. The group currently comprises 81 described species distributed throughout the Old World; however, the Korean fauna currently includes only three species in two genera, Calicotis Meyrick, 1889 and Cuprina Sinev, 1988. In this study, two new species Pediformis astathmeta sp. nov. and Calicotis atricosta sp. nov. are described, and three species Cuprina porphyrantha (Meyrick, 1913), Petala aedificatrix (Terada, 2016) and P. margaritacea (Terada, 2016) are reported from Korea for the first time.

All material examined was collected from Jeju Island, the southernmost and largest island of Korea. To verify the generic placement and species-level identification of these taxa, phylogenetic analyses were conducted using five gene regions (COI, EF- 1 α, CAD, H 3, and Wg). Both maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference analyses yielded largely congruent topologies and the species examined were consistently placed within their respective genera and grouped with conspecific sequences.

A distribution map, photographs of adults and genitalia, and DNA sequence information are provided.