DEC: a new miniature inverted-repeat transposable element from the genome of the beetle Tenebrio molitor

In this paper we describe a novel family of miniature inverted-repeat trans posable elements (MITEs), named DEC, isolated from the genome of the beetle Tenebrio molitor. These elements are highly reiterated and their number is estimated to be around 3500 per haploid genome. Two of them have been isol ated and the two sequences are 84% identical. Like other MITEs, they are ch aracterized by their small size, their A + T richness, the presence of term inal inverted repeats and the absence of open reading frames. These data su ggest that MITEs are probably widely distributed in arthropods.