Detection of Horizontal Gene Transfers from Phylogenetic Comparisons

Bacterial phylogenies have become one of the most important challenges for microbial ecology. This field started in the mid-1970s with the aim of using the sequence of the small subunit ribosomal RNA (16S) tool to infer bacterial phylogenies. Phylogenetic hypotheses based on other sequences usually give conflicting topologies that reveal different evolutionary histories, which in some cases may be the result of horizontal gene transfer events. Currently, one of the major goals of molecular biology is to understand the role that horizontal gene transfer plays in species adaptation and evolution. In this work, we compared the phylogenetic tree based on 16S with the tree based on dszC, a gene involved in the cleavage of carbon-sulfur bonds. Bacteria of several genera perform this survival task when living in environments lacking free mineral sulfur. The biochemical pathway of the desulphurization process was extensively studied due to its economic importance, since this step is expensive and indispensable in fuel production. Our results clearly show that horizontal gene transfer events could be detected using common phylogenetic methods with gene sequences obtained from public sequence databases

Caracterização da variabilidade genetica da mosca do berne Dermatobia hominis (Diptera : oestridae) atraves da tecnica de RAPD-PCR

Orientador: Ana Maria L. de Azeredo EspinDissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de BiologiaMestrad

Genes mitocondriais e hipoteses filogeneticas no genero tomoplagia (Diptera: Tephritidae) e no grupo tripunctata (Diptera: Drosophilidae)

Orientador: Vera Nisaka SolferiniTese (doutorado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de BiologiaDoutorad

Habitus of <i>Listroscelis angustifrons</i> (Piza) comb. nov.

<p>A–C Male (NMW) from unknown locality in the state of Espírito Santo, (A) lateral view, (B) frontal view. Scale bars = 0.5 mm.</p

Habitus of <i>Monocerophora spinosa</i> (Karny).

<p>A–C Holotype male (NMW), (A) lateral view, (B) dorsal view, (C) frontal view. D–F Female (CELC) from Parque Nacional do Itatiaia, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, (D) lateral view, (E) dorsal view, (F) frontal view. Scale bars for dorsal and lateral views (horizontal bar) and frontal views (vertical bar) = 0.5 mm.</p

Habitus of <i>Cerberodon portokalipes</i> sp. nov.

<p>A–C Holotype male, (A) lateral view, (B) dorsal view, (C) frontal view. D–F Allotype female, (D) lateral view, (E) dorsal view, (F) frontal view. Scale bars for dorsal and lateral views (horizontal bar) and frontal views (vertical bar) = 0.5 mm.</p

Habitus of <i>Listroscelis fusca</i> sp. nov.

<p>A–C Holotype male, (A) lateral view, (B) dorsal view, (C) frontal view. D–F Allotype female, (D) lateral view, (E) dorsal view, (F) frontal view. Scale bars for dorsal and lateral views (horizontal bar) and frontal views (vertical bar) = 0.5 mm.</p

Habitus of <i>Megatympanon speculatum</i> Piza.

<p>A–C Male (MNRJ) from Petrópolis, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, (A) lateral view, (B) dorsal view, (C) frontal view. D–F Female (MNRJ) from Itaguaí, in the state of Rio de janeiro, (D) lateral view, (E) dorsal view, (F) frontal view. Scale bars for dorsal and lateral views (horizontal bar) and frontal views (vertical bar) = 0.5 mm.</p

Habitus of <i>Cerberodon viridis</i> Perty.

<p>A–C Male (MNRJ) from Petrópolis, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, (A) lateral view, (B) dorsal view, (C) frontal view. D–F Female (CELC) from RPPN Bacchus, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, (D) lateral view, (E) dorsal view, (F) frontal view. Scale bars for dorsal and lateral views (horizontal bar) and frontal views (vertical bar) = 0.5 mm.</p