Heliozelidae are a widespread, evolutionarily early diverging family of small, day-flying
monotrysian moths, for which a comprehensive phylogeny is lacking. We generated the
first molecular phylogeny of the family using DNA sequences of two mitochondrial genes
(COI and COII) and two nuclear genes (H3 and 28S) from 130 Heliozelidae specimens,
including eight of the twelve known genera: Antispila, Antispilina, Coptodisca, Heliozela,
Holocacista, Hoplophanes, Pseliastis, and Tyriozela. Our results provide strong support
for five major Heliozelidae clades: (i) a large widespread clade containing the leaf-mining
genera Antispilina, Coptodisca and Holocacista and some species of Antispila, (ii)
a clade containing most of the described Antispila, (iii) a clade containing the leaf-mining
genus Heliozela and the monotypic genus Tyriozela, (iv) an Australian clade containing
Pseliastis and (v) an Australian clade containing Hoplophanes. Each clade includes
several new species and potentially new genera. Collectively, our data uncover a rich
and undescribed diversity that appears to be especially prevalent in Australia. Our
work highlights the need for a major taxonomic revision of the family and for generating
a robust molecular phylogeny using multi-gene approaches in order to resolve the relationships
among clades.