title: Ontogeny and Molecular Phylogeny of Apoamphisiella vernalis Reveal Unclear Separation between Genera Apoamphisiella and Paraurostyla (Protozoa, Ciliophora, Hypotricha).
abstract: Morphology and divisional morphogenesis of the hypotrich ciliate Apoamphisiella vernalis are investigated based on two populations from Brazil. Typical specimens of A. vernalis replicates its ventral ciliature from six fronto-ventral-transverse (FVT) anlagen independently formed for proter and opisthe, plus one or more short anlagen located between IV and V, which form surplus transverse cirri. Dorsal morphogenesis occurs as in typical oxytrichid dorsomarginalians, viz., with formation of three anlagen and fragmentation of the rightmost one. Dorsomarginal kineties are formed near anterior end of right marginal cirral row anlagen. Various anomalous specimens exhibiting more than two long ventral rows were found, which are explained by increasing the number of FVT anlagen and/or the number of cirri produced by anlagen. Comparative ontogeny and phylogenetic analyses based on the 18S rDNA reveal that Apoamphisiella vernalis is closely affine to North American and European strains of the Paraurostyla weissei complex. Their reduced genetic distances and conspicuous morphological variability show that both genera can overlap, which implies the necessity of re-evaluating the contextual relevance of some morphological characters commonly used for genus-level separation within hypotrich taxa.
authors.affiliation: Laboratório de Biologia Molecular "Francisco Mauro Salzano", Instituto de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Federal do Pará, Belém, PA, Brazil.
authors.forename: Larissa Araguaia Monteiro
authors.initials: LA
authors.lastname: de Castro
authors.affiliation: División Invertebrados, Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales "Bernardino Rivadavia", Buenos Aires, Argentina.
authors.forename: Gabriela Cristina
authors.initials: GC
authors.lastname: Küppers
authors.affiliation: Laboratório de Biologia Evolutiva Teórica e Aplicada, Departamento de Genética, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil.
authors.forename: Noemi Mendes
authors.initials: NM
authors.lastname: Fernandes
authors.affiliation: Molecular Evolution and Animal Systematics, Institute of Biology, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany.
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Schlegel
authors.affiliation: Laboratório de Biologia Molecular "Francisco Mauro Salzano", Instituto de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Federal do Pará, Belém, PA, Brazil.|Laboratory of Evolutionary Protistology, Instituto de Biociências, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, SP, Brazil.
authors.forename: Thiago da Silva
authors.initials: Tda S
authors.lastname: Paiva
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001499:Bayes Theorem; D001522:Behavior, Animal; D001938:Brazil; D016798:Ciliophora / Q000145:classification* / Q000166:cytology*; D004777:Environment; D007700:Kinetics; D016013:Likelihood Functions; D008855:Microscopy, Electron, Scanning; D009024:Morphogenesis; D010802:Phylogeny; D012337:RNA, Ribosomal, 18S / Q000235:genetics; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D013045:Species Specificity
chemical_list: D012337:RNA, Ribosomal, 18S