Ciliados endêmicos (Alveolata, Ciliophora) que habitam fitotelmata em bromélias do Parque Estadual do Ibitipoca, Minas Gerais, Brasil: diversidade, especificidade e notas sobre conservação

Abstract

The Ibitipoca State Park is an important area for the conservation of biodiversity. Although studies on fauna and flora have already been carried out in the region, little is known about the ciliates species found in the park. This study had as main goals to inventory the ciliate fauna that are present in bromeliad tanks in the Ibitipoca State Park; to amplify the number of sequences from endemic ciliate from the phytotelmic environment, and to investigate the specificities relationships between ciliate and bromeliad present in the studied area. Bromeliad tanks have the capacity of storing rainwater and organic matter from falling debris, forming microenvironments known as phytotelma. The microbiota that lives in bromeliad tanks is constituted by algae, fungi, bacteria, flagellated, ciliates, microinvertebrates, among other microorganisms. Ciliates are considered as essential components of the phytotelma due to their many functions inside this environment: predation, bacterial population controls, nutrient cycling and energy transference between the trophic levels in the phytotelma. Due to this importance, they are the target of our study. The field excursions occurred during the rainy season between October 2017 and April 2018, where it was collected 261 samples of phytotelmic content present in the tank of 15 bromeliad species. The samples were analyzed with the aid of optical microscopy, and it was observed 11 ciliate taxa. Four new sequences of endemic ciliates from bromeliad tanks were obtained using the molecular marker 18S-rDNA. Among the observed ciliate, we highlight the presence of three morphotypes of the Lambornella genus. The phylogenetic analysis made from the Cytochrome Oxidase gene sequences showed a sharp divergence between the three morphotypes, may indicate the presence of new species. According to the ciliate occurrence and distribution, it was possible to notice that it does not occur specificity between ciliate and bromeliad that live in the Ibitipoca State Park. In the face of the obtained data, we highlight the need to increase the sampling effort in neotropical ecosystems to have a better understanding of the ciliate diversity.