Life Sciences Commons^™

Relative Abundances Of The Recently Introduced Barnacles, Megabalanus Coccopoma And An Unidentified Species Of Megabalanus, In The Southeastern U.S., Jennifer L. Tyson

Honors College Theses

ABSTRACT

Megabalanus coccopoma is a prominent invasive species off the coast of Georgia. Recently, among collected samples thought to be M. coccopoma, several individuals of an unidentified species of barnacle were found. The species has been identified as a Megabalanus species, but is still unidentified to the species level. Species identification is difficult due to morphological variation, inconsistent taxonomic keys, and unknown origin. In this study I developed a method to accurately distinguish M. coccopoma from the unidentified Megabalanus sp. using sequence differences in the mitochondrial Cytochrome Oxidase I (COI) gene. This study will provide an accurate estimate of …

Genetic Structure Of Ixodes Scapularis Say 1821 (Acari: Ixodidae), The Blacklegged Tick, By Microsatellite Analysis, John Ludwig

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The blacklegged tick, Ixodes scapularis (Acari: Ixodidae) is the subject of intense research due to its economic importance from being a vector of several diseases. Previous studies have examined its taxonomic status and more recently, its genetic structure. This study embarked upon resolving the questions surrounding the genetic structuring of the tick, by using different molecular markers. Molecular data were first phylogenetically analyzed by using four different mitochondrial and nuclear markers (12SrDNA n=483, Dloop n=432, ITS2 n=156, Actin n=117). A Bayesian tree was inferred from the concatenated mitochondrial dataset, whereas nuclear gene markers were found to be uninformative. Nine microsatellites …