RUI: Biodiversity of testate (shelled) amoebae in New England bogs and fens

我们生活在一个微生物星球上：微生物在地球上生存了超过 30 亿年，从数量、生物量和生物多样性来看，微生物构成了地球上生命的大部分。我们对微生物的生物多样性仍然知之甚少，尽管扩展我们的知识有可能促进与生态系统健康相关的国家利益。该项目重点关注一组微生物，即有壳变形虫，它们在新英格兰沼泽和沼泽中数量丰富，是顶级捕食者。有睾丸变形虫根据其睾丸（壳）的形状和成分进行分类有着丰富的历史；然而，这些特征已被证明在识别方面具有误导性，因为存在许多神秘物种。因此，该研究项目依靠分子工具来探索它们跨越时间和空间的生物多样性。鉴于有遗嘱变形虫是气候变化的标记，并且在沼泽和沼泽等受威胁的湿地栖息地中大量存在，此类研究非常重要。除了科学发现之外，该研究项目还将培训一组女本科生和一名博士后，研究微生物的生物多样性。有遗嘱变形虫已被用作古生态学和当代研究中的生物指示剂，并且一些类群被认为是泥炭藓主导的栖息地中的顶级捕食者。 该研究项目将阐明新英格兰沼泽和沼泽中不同季节的有遗嘱变形虫的多样性。 形态学和系统发育物种的比较，最初基于两个分子标记定义，然后通过转录组分析进行多位点描述，将允许探索该分支的生物多样性。 这项工作将通过评估细小（局部）和更大（新英格兰）规模的变化来探讨驱动睾丸变形虫分布的生态因素。 还将使用基因组中目标区域的高通量测序来表征社区成员之间的模式，从而可以检测稀有的社区成员。 这项研究将从研究不足的真核生物进化枝中生成睾丸变形虫的图像、基因序列数据、比对、系统发育和转录组（即表达的基因），所有这些都将提供给社区。 从事该项目的学生和博士后研究员将发展微生物多样性、显微镜检查和高通量测序数据分析方面的专业知识。 参与者招募的目的是扩大代表性不足的少数群体的参与。

We live on a microbial planet: microbes have inhabited the Earth for more than 3 billion years and comprise most of life on Earth in terms of number, biomass and biodiversity. We still know very little about the biodiversity of microbes, though extending our knowledge has the potential to advance the national interest in relation to ecosystem health. This project focuses on one group of microbes, namely the testate (shelled) amoebae, which are abundant and top predators in New England bogs and fens. Testate amoebae have a rich history of classification based on the shape and composition of their tests (shells); yet these traits have been shown to be misleading in relation to their identification, because there are many cryptic species. Hence, this research project relies on molecular tools to explore their biodiversity across time and space. Such studies are important given that testate amoebae serve as markers for changing climates and are abundant in threatened wetland habitats like bogs and fens. Beyond scientific discovery, this research project will train a group of undergraduate women plus a postdoctoral fellow on the biodiversity of microorganisms. Testate amoebae have been used as bioindicators in both paleoecological and contemporary studies, and some taxa are argued to be top predators in Sphagnum dominated habitats. This research project will illuminate the diversity of testate amoebae from bogs and fens within New England and across seasons. Comparison of morphological and phylogenetic species, defined initially based on two molecular markers and then by multilocus delineation through transcriptome analyses, will allow exploration of the biodiversity of this clade. The work will probe the ecological factors that drive the distribution of testate amoebae by assessing fine (local) and larger (New England) scale variation. Patterns among community members will also be characterized using high-throughput sequencing of target regions in the genome, which allows detection of rare community members. This research will generate images of testate amoebae, gene sequence data, alignments, phylogenies, and transcriptomes (i.e. expressed genes) from a poorly studied clade of eukaryotes, all of which will be made available to the community. Students and postdoctoral fellows working on this project will develop expertise in microbial diversity, microscopy, and analyses of high throughput sequencing data. Participant recruitment will aim to broaden participation from underrepresented minorities.