HIERARCHICAL GENE TREES AND MOLECULAR PHYLOGENY OF THE ROTIFERA - USEOF THE POLYMERASE CHAIN-REACTION (PCR) TO DISSECT ECOLOGICAL AND EVOLUTIONARY PATTERNS

The study of rotifer phylogenies and the analysis of population-level processes historically have been disjunct. This is despite a growing r ecognition that there are many ways in which rotifer population biolog ists and ecologists might profit from the availability of a comprehens ive phylogeny of the group. New molecular methods which can be applied to a wide range of genetic systems and systematic grades will shortly eliminate the methodological (and perhaps conceptual) distinction bet ween these fields. Of particular importance is the development of the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), a technique of synthetic DNA amplific ation which produces concentrated preparations of selected genes from complex mixtures of nuclear and mitochondrial genomes. Analysis of PCR products can provide hierarchal genetic comparisons from the level of local rotifer populations through broad evolutionary (at least molecu lar) phylogenies.