Part A

Part
B

University of Arkansas at Little Rock, BIOL 1411 (Anatomy and Physiology I)

Instructor: Scott Hearnsberger

Part C

1. Who is the professor that you have taken a class with? Or a professor that you are
currently taking a class with? John Shadwick
2. What is the name of the class? Give the alpha code AND number. BIOL 1543, Principles of
Biology
3. What year did he/she write their dissertation? 2010
4. What is the name of the dissertation? Ecological and evolutionary studies of protosteloid
amoebae
5. What institution did the professor go to when he/she published their dissertation?
University of Arkansas

Skip to the end of the dissertation. What was the conclusion of the study? (You can type this
word for word.)
“In the Great Smoky Mountains National Park study it was found that 1) not only is the Great Smoky
Mountains National Park a hotspot for diversity of plants and animals, but it is very diverse in
protosteloid amoebae, with 26 of the 32 described species found in the park, 2) Protostelium
mycophaga, Soliformovum irregularis, Schizoplasmodiopsis pseudoendospora, and Schizoplasmodium
cavostelioides were the most frequently recovered species. Protostelium mycophaga, S. irregularis
and S.pseudoendospora have been the most frequently recovered species in several studies, and I
now believe they are dominant on primary substrates in most temperate habitats (Aguilar et al 2007,
Best and Spiegel 1984, Moore and Spiegel 2000, Tesmer et al 2005), 3) primary plant tissues in the
aerial and ground litter microhabitats had the same number of species, but the steeper species
accumulation curve for the ground litter microhabitat indicated that the species density was greater in
the ground litter microhabitat, 4) only very rare species were recorded from either aerial or ground
litter microhabitats exclusively, although some species showed a preference for one or the other.
Protostelium nocturnum was recovered from the aerial microhabitat more than the ground litter
microhabitat to a statistically significant degree, while S. pseudoendospora, Nematostelium gracile,
Schizoplasmodiopsis vulgare, Nematostelium ovalum, and "Protostelium arachisporum" preferred the
ground litter microhabitat to a statistically significant degree, 5) bark samples yielded 20 species of
protosteloid amoebae. Protostelium mycophaga was dominant on this substrate but to a lesser
degree that on primary tissues, 6) several species including Protosporangium bisporum,
Proiosporangium articulation, and Protosporangium fragile occurred on bark but not on primary
tissues, 7) angiosperm bark had 19 species, similar to the 20 species on each of the primary tissues,
and much more than the nine species found on gymnosperm bark, 8) coarse woody debris turned out
to be more species rich than expected with 15 species and a projected 19.8 by the ACE richness
estimator, 9) certain species (e.g. Spseudoendospora, N. gracile, and S. vulgare) seem to prefer the
ground litter microhabitat, while, other species were more variable and habitat preferences seemed
also to depend of the microhabitat from which they were sampled.

In the molecular phylogenetic study of Protostelium, the nuclear small subunit ribosomal DNA gene
(SSUrDNA) was used to investigate phylogenetic relationships among species in the genera
Protostelium and Planoprotostelium, and 31 isolates diagnosed as variants of the morphospecies
Protostelium mycophaga. It was found 1) that the species that branch basally in the genus
Protostelium are P. nocturnum and P. okumukumu, 2) that the genus Planoprotostelium fell within the
clade of isolates previously identified as P. mycophaga and intermingled in a highly supported clade
with isolates of P. mycophaga var. crassipes, 3) that by using both molecular phylogenetic position
and morphological characters, two new species could be described, 4) that at least six well supported
monophyletic groups exist for isolates that were all previously identified as P. mycophaga or PI.
aurantium, and that it can be argued that each of these monophyletic groups has a global or nearly
global distribution.”