Dugesia hepta Pala, Casu & Vacca, 1981 and Dugesia benazzii Lepori, 1951 are two freshwater planarian species from the islands of Corsica and Sardinia. Dugesia hepta is endemic of Sardinia and distributed in four northern hydrographic basins where it co-occurs with D. benazzii, which has a wider Tyrrhenian distribution. Although these species have been broadly studied—especially D. benazzii—as regards to their variety of reproductive patterns as well as for their karyological diversity, little is known about them from a molecular phylogenetic perspective. For the first time, we present a molecular phylogenetic tree of the two species and their populations based on two molecular markers—one mitochondrial, Cox1, and one nuclear, Dunuc12. Our results not only confirm that both species are molecularly distinct but also show that D. benazzii’s Corsican and Sardinian populations could belong to separate species. Furthermore, we present the first demonstration of a natural hybridization between different species in the genus Dugesia on the basis of molecular data.

中文翻译：

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Dugesia hepta 和 Dugesia benazzii (Platyhelminthes: Tricladida): 两个偶尔发生性关系的同域物种？

Dugesia hepta Pala, Casu & Vacca, 1981 和 Dugesia benazzii Lepori, 1951 是来自科西嘉岛和撒丁岛的两种淡水涡虫物种。Dugesia hepta 是撒丁岛特有的，分布在四个北部水文盆地，在那里它与 D. benazzii 共同发生，后者具有更广泛的第勒尼安分布。尽管已对这些物种（尤其是 D. benazzii）的繁殖模式多样性以及核学多样性进行了广泛的研究，但从分子系统发育的角度对它们知之甚少。我们第一次基于两个分子标记——一个线粒体，Cox1，一个核，Dunuc12，展示了这两个物种及其种群的分子系统发育树。我们的结果不仅证实了这两个物种在分子上是不同的，而且还表明 D. benazzii 的科西嘉和撒丁岛种群可能属于不同的物种。此外，我们根据分子数据首次展示了 Dugesia 属中不同物种之间的自然杂交。