Amoeba proteus Pallas, 1766 (Leidy, 1878) isolated from the natural biotopes of Ukraine (morphology and phylogenetic relationships)

Abstract

Naked amoebas of the genus Amoeba Bory de Saint-Vincent, 1822 are large protists, which are among the favourite objects of biochemical and cytogenetic studies. However, they are rare in natural biotopes, and are least represented on molecular phylogenetic trees. I sequenced the 18S rRNA gene of the Amoeba proteus strain AP07 (ON907618), which presents the typical morphology of A. proteus. A phylogenetic analysis showed that Amoeba proteus AP07, found in the River Stokhid of the Volyn Region, is reliably grouped with the isolate Amoeba proteus (AJ314604) from the reservoirs of Switzerland. These isolates were placed in a sister group to representatives of the genus Chaos Linnaeus, 1767, which confirmed its position, as established earlier on the basis of morphological characteristics. All of them form a relatively well-supported clade, which corresponds to the family Amoebidae.