Deciphering the major trends of molecular and morphological evolution in the Amoebozoa

Abstract

The present project seeks to characterize amoebozoan diversity in Brazil, integrating aspects of traditional protistology with cutting-edge molecular techniques. Amoebae will be isolated from freshwater and marine environments in order to capture diversity in a comprehensive manner. Collected organisms will be subjected to two main study strategies: 1) unculturable organisms will be photo-documented and single-cell genome amplified, while; 2) culturable organisms will be grown monoxenically in order to generate large quantities of DNA as well as cDNA for transcriptome piro-sequencing using the 454 Titanium platform. Many of the isolated organisms will likely be new or little known species. These will be individually described along with detailed morphological studies using electronic microscopy, and their phylogenetic position will be assessed based on multigene reconstructions, on at least 4 genes (SSU-rDNA, actin, alpha and beta tubulin). Other organisms will have 8-10 genetic markers characterized and used in comprehensive phylogenetic reconstructions with emphasis on the basal relationships of Amoebozoa. The 10-12 organisms which will have the transcriptome comprehensively sequenced will be used in studies illuminating the patterns of evolution by gene duplication in Amoebozoa, with special emphasis on the actin gene family. Finally, photographic, videographic and molecular data generated during the project will be disseminated by publication in highly recognized international journals, and made available to the lay public by the creation and deposition of curated data in publicly available websites. (AU)