Abstract
Gastrotrichs are aquatic microinvertebrates (less than 1 mm) and an important component of the benthos and phytofauna of marine and freshwater habitats. Despite the large number of specimens in different habitats, this taxon is poor studied possibly due to the small size and fragility of their bodies. Moreover, although the taxonomic studies of the group initiated in the end of nineteenth century, currently the phylogenetic relationships within Gastrotricha are still far from being considered satisfactory. Thus, this project has different aims: a) comparative morphological analysis of external structures using techniques of scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and confocal laser microscopy; b) construct a well-supported phylogenetic hypothesis of Gastrotricha based on molecular (nuclear and mitochondrial DNA) and morphological in order to better understand the evolutionary history of the taxon; c) formally describe the gastrotrichs collected by Garraffoni et al. (2010) and Araújo et al. (2013) and still identified until genus level; d) designate neotypes and document, using microscopy with differential interference contrast optics (DIC) and SEM, the 12 new species described by the Polish researcher Dr. Jacek Kisielewski, from State of São paulo, in the early 1990 e) consolidate the meiofauna collection of the Zoological Museum of the Institute of Biology, State University of Campinas (ZUEC / Unicamp). With these goals, this project will help to establish a research group new from Latin American focus on understanding the systematics, evolution and ecology of gastrotrics and other meiofaunal taxa poor understudied. (AU)
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