Genetics of Hemimastigotes Desribed

attempt5001

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https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/...wemqx-pVWQnTQpo0IFzg4J3lEXqMRmgNBq_4sScmgtlvQ

A bit of a "post 'n dash" (apologies), but I'd be interested to hear what the community here thinks of this. In short, a microbiology graduate student scoops up some dirt on a whim during a hike and has a look under a microscope back at the lab. She discovers some phenotypically unique looking organisms and has a colleague perform single organism genetic sequencing.
Turns out the organisms (at least two different varieties as far as the article reports) are so genetically different from other genetically classified organisms that they seem to represent a new kingdom. Very interesting in my opinion, but the fact that they were "scooped up at random" suggests to me that these organisms (and perhaps other new kindgoms of organisms) may not be as rare as previously thought. Appreciate thoughts of those educated in this field and will check back as soon as I can.
 
Hemimastigotes? Does that mean they only chew on one side of their mouths? ;)
 
Hemi - half (Latin)
Mast - breast (Greek)
Ig - not (prefix, variant of in-, Latin)
Ote - the type thus characterized (Greek suffix)

Hemimastigotes, therefore, are not members of a class characterized by having half a breast. Which is obviously true.

(A more likely derivation would relate to the Greek "mastigos," a whip or scourge.)
 
Myriad said:
Hemi - half (Latin)
Mast - breast (Greek)
Ig - not (prefix, variant of in-, Latin)
Ote - the type thus characterized (Greek suffix)

Hemimastigotes, therefore, are not members of a class characterized by having half a breast. Which is obviously true.

(A more likely derivation would relate to the Greek "mastigos," a whip or scourge.)
Click to expand...

Hemi=half (we agree)

-masti- as in 'masticate, to chew'
-gote-(we agree, 'the one who is thus characterized )

So either "chews on one side of his mouth) OR

"To eat half of a goat".

(I've been doing Lithuanian Genealogy today. Looks like I found a GGpa whose occupation " uzsiemimas juodadarbis" was a google literate translate "black coffin". It means "dead end job", unskilled bust-ass labor. )
 
An informative article:
https://gizmodo.com/bizarre-microbes-represent-a-major-new-branch-on-the-ev-1830496441

Points out that the study is valuable and interesting, but that assignment to new super-kingdom, etc. depends on the criteria being used by the assigner. "Results may vary."

Organism is very interesting no matter the details of the taxonomy.

Interesting origin of species name too:
"The previously known species is called Spironema and the new one was dubbed Hemimastix kukwesjijk (pronounced “ku–ga–wes–jij–k”), which means “rapacious hairy ogre” in the language of the Mi’kmaq First Nations people of Nova Scotia."
 
Trebuchet said:
I'm just trying to figure out what the other strange bottle is. But there's bacon. BACON! I'll just have that, you can keep the eggs.
Click to expand...

Laugh. I assumed that was the soap bottle for washing up. Good reminder to all scientists to keep a head shot on file in case you make the news unexpectedly. I can picture the discussion:

Grad student 1: Hey need a picture of our lab group for a press release ...

Grad student 2: Well, we have the one where we cooked bacon and eggs with WD40 or the one where we dressed up like Twisted Sister so we could film our entry for "dance your thesis" ...
 
Giordano said:
An informative article:
https://gizmodo.com/bizarre-microbes-represent-a-major-new-branch-on-the-ev-1830496441

Points out that the study is valuable and interesting, but that assignment to new super-kingdom, etc. depends on the criteria being used by the assigner. "Results may vary."

Organism is very interesting no matter the details of the taxonomy.

Interesting origin of species name too:
"The previously known species is called Spironema and the new one was dubbed Hemimastix kukwesjijk (pronounced “ku–ga–wes–jij–k”), which means “rapacious hairy ogre” in the language of the Mi’kmaq First Nations people of Nova Scotia."
Click to expand...

Thanks Giordano. That's a really helpful article for further context.
 
Just to point out fungi and animals are quite closely related (as these things go). Fungi are more closely related to animals than either are to plants. All are eukaryotes and more closely related to each other than to prokaryotes, then there are the archaebacteria. So they are just sitting in the eukaryotes perhaps not plants, but on the fungi, animal grouping. Personally I am a slime mould fan, I did slime moulds for my A level biology project. Amoeba that come together, differentiate and form fruiting bodies, or hunt as a multicellular grex. How cool is that!
 
Hemimastigota -- from Greek hemi- "half" and mastix "whip" -- "half a whip". Referring to the organism's flagellum (Latin for "whip"). It's one of several difficult-to-place organisms that branched off very early in the history of eukaryotedom, about when the major groups of them branched off from each other. Another one that made news some months back was Collodictyon.

Here is the phylogeny so far:
  • Amorphea
    • Opisthokonta
      • Choanoflagellida + Metazoa
      • Fungi
    • Amoebozoa
  • Diaphoretickes
    • Archaeplastida
    • SAR
      • SA
        • Stramenopiles
        • Alveolata
      • Rhizaria
  • Excavata
According to Hemimastigophora is a novel supra-kingdom-level lineage of eukaryotes | Nature, those protists are closest to Diaphoretickes as a whole.

Collodictyon itself, along with Mantamonas and Rigifilida form "CRuMs", most closely related to Amorphea as a whole.
 
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