Discovery and analysis of Aphelidea and Rozella species of the Cryptomycota phylum

隐菌门 Aphelidea 和 Rozella 的发现和分析

• 批准号: 1455611
• 负责人: Martha Powell
• 金额: $ 49.45万
• 依托单位: University of Alabama Tuscaloosa
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-03-15 至 2019-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1455611&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Discovery; analysis; Aphelidea; Rozella; species

The Cryptomycota is a recently discovered phylum of organisms that parasitize algae and fungi hosts. As first described, the Cryptomycota included only two organisms of known morphologies and over 40 other organisms known only from DNA sequences collected from freshwater, sediments and soils, which suggested that this enigmatic group might be genetically as diverse as the whole Kingdom Fungi. New molecular techniques have the power to identify novel organisms such as these in the environment but the challenge to link the DNA data with physical organisms remains. This project puts a face on these environmental molecular markers with the isolation, culture and structural and molecular characterization of these seemingly ubiquitous, but poorly known, organisms. The known organisms have characteristics of fungi and protists and the project will resolve the intriguing question whether these parasites are fungi or protists. Because Cryptomycota have recently been identified as primary pests of commercially grown algae for production of biofuel, food and pharmaceuticals, this research is important to development of protection strategies for these industries. With greater knowledge of Cryptomycota diversity, their environmental impacts on host populations, food webs, and sustainability of life in nature can be explored. This project will train graduate students and undergraduate students in methods to collect, observe, and describe Cryptomycota, providing the next generation of experts. This project aims to discover and culture described and new species of Cryptomycota, characterizing them with developmental, ultrastructural and molecular features. Algal and zoosporic fungal hosts of Cryptomycota will be collected from diverse habitats in eastern and southern United States. It is hypothesized that motile cells of Cryptomycota harbor ultrastructural architectural patterns in organellar arrangements which reflect evolutionary relationships. Analyses of seven genes will reveal phylogenetic relationships and permit mapping of host, nutritional and ultrastructural character state evolution, thereby generating hypotheses about early fungal evolution and divergence of Cryptomycota from protists and animals. A Cryptomycota website will include images, taxonomic summaries, interactive identification keys, and applications of ultrastructural and molecular characters in phylogenetic analyses, making this group more tractable for future studies. The research is transformative because cultures of Cryptomycota will be available to the community for even more extensive research. Undergraduate students in freshman biology will be given an authentic research experience making field collections of host organisms, screening for presence of Cryptomycota endoparasites, and characterizing with gene sequences, stimulating students' interest in research careers in biodiversity and conservation.

隐菌门是最近发现的寄生于藻类和真菌宿主的生物门。正如第一次描述的那样，隐菌门只包括两种已知形态的生物和40多种其他生物，这些生物只从淡水，沉积物和土壤中收集的DNA序列中知道，这表明这个神秘的群体可能在遗传上与整个真菌王国一样多样。新的分子技术有能力识别环境中的新生物，但将DNA数据与物理生物联系起来的挑战仍然存在。该项目通过对这些看似无处不在但知之甚少的生物体的分离、培养、结构和分子表征，对这些环境分子标记物进行了研究。已知的生物体具有真菌和原生生物的特征，该项目将解决这些寄生虫是真菌还是原生生物的有趣问题。由于隐菌门最近已被确定为用于生产生物燃料、食品和药品的商业种植藻类的主要害虫，因此这项研究对这些行业的保护策略的发展很重要。随着对隐菌门多样性的更多了解，可以探索它们对宿主种群，食物网和自然界生命可持续性的环境影响。本计画将训练研究生与本科生收集、观察与描述隐菌门的方法，提供下一代的专家。该项目旨在发现和培养隐菌门的已知和新种，并对其进行发育、超微结构和分子特征的表征。将从美国东部和南部的不同栖息地收集隐菌门的藻类和游动孢子真菌宿主。据推测，隐菌门运动细胞的海港超微结构的建筑模式，反映了进化关系的细胞器的安排。七个基因的分析将揭示系统发育关系，并允许映射的主机，营养和超微结构的字符状态的演变，从而产生有关早期真菌的进化和分歧隐菌门从原生生物和动物的假说。一个Cryptomycota网站将包括图像，分类摘要，交互式识别键，并在系统发育分析中的超微结构和分子特征的应用，使这一组更易于处理的未来研究。这项研究是变革性的，因为隐菌门的文化将提供给社区进行更广泛的研究。大一生物学的本科生将获得真实的研究经验，使宿主生物的实地收集，筛选隐菌门内寄生虫的存在，并以基因序列为特征，激发学生对生物多样性和保护研究事业的兴趣。