Dinoflagellates are ubiquitous marine and freshwater protists. As free-living photosynthetic plankton, they account for much of the primary productivity of oceans and lakes. As photosynthetic symbionts, they provide essential nutrients to all reef-building corals and numerous other marine invertebrates, supporting coral reefs, the most diverse marine ecosystem, a rich food source, and a potenti...

Title of Dissertation: DINOFLAGELLATE GENOMIC ORGANIZATION AND PHYLOGENETIC MARKER DISCOVERY UTILIZING DEEP SEQUENCING DATA Gregory Scott Mendez, Doctor of Philosophy, 2016 Dissertation directed by: Professor Charles F. Delwiche, Cell Biology and Molecular Genetics Dinoflagellates possess large genomes in which most genes are present in many copies. This has made studies of their genomic organi...

Freshwater dinoflagellates may form dense blooms during winter in ice-covered lakes. Unlike their marine counterparts, freshwater dinoflagellates are rarely considered to be potential toxin producers. Here we tested whether the winter species Peridinium aciculiferum produces a toxin(s) and investigated the potential adaptive function of that toxin, i.e., predator defense or inhibition of compet...

Microplastics are ubiquitous contaminants in marine ecosystems worldwide, threatening fisheries production, food safety, and human health. Ingestion of microplastics by fish large zooplankton has been documented, but there few studies focusing on single-celled predators, including heterotrophic dinoflagellates. In laboratory experiments, the dinoflagellate species Oxyrrhis marina Gyrodinium sp....

A synthesis of available data on the morphological diversity of polykrikoid dinoflagellates allowed us to formulate a hypothesis of relationships that help explain character evolution within the group. Phylogenetic analyses of new SSU rDNA sequences from Pheopolykrikos beauchampii Chatton, Polykrikos kofoidii Chatton, and Polykrikos lebourae Herdman helped refine this hypothetical framework. Ou...

Some dinoflagellates possess the remarkable genetic, biochemical, and cellular machinery to produce bioluminescence. Bioluminescent species appear to be ubiquitous in surface waters globally and include numerous cosmopolitan and harmful taxa. Nevertheless, bioluminescence remains an enigmatic topic in biology, particularly with regard to the organisms' lifestyle. In this paper, we review the li...