Dissertation Research: Two Independent Nuclear Gene Data Sets, SSU rDNA & vATPase, and Pyrenomycete Evolution

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Pyrenomycetous ascomycetes have been the subject of numerous studies that have produced phylogenetic hypotheses that remain untested. The stumbling block has been a paucity of diagnostic characters above the ordinal level. It is the goal of this project to infer relationships, i.e., natural groupings, among and within orders of fungi that traditionally have been grouped as pyrenomycetes. This phylogeny will be based upon the nucleotide sequences of both nuclear coding regions (SSU rDNA and vATPase). Congruency between the two data sets will be strong support for the relationships in question, whereas incongruencies will question such relationships. The resulting phylogeny will be compared to those of previous studies that have employed characters from morphology, ultrastructure and cell biology. By using two independent molecular data sets we will be able to discern between the gene phylogenies and the species phylogeny.