MicrobeHunter.com Microscopy Forum

We see a stiff, domed cell, with a long AZM, strong caudal cirri and no marginal cirri. It's Euplotes sp., seen from the dorsal aspect. The critter is in some distress: the contractile vacuole is distended, the caudal cirri are rather floppy, and the cell is spinning erratically.

Hmmm...assuming this is not from a marine sample, there aren't too many other heterotrich candidates. Linostomella (previously known as Linostoma) is too small. I suppose Condylostomides could be a contender. It could be I'm misinterpreting the footage, of course. :) Heterotrichs typically have clea...

To me, it looks like a very squashed heterotrich, but I don't see anything to suggest it is Climacostumum . It would not be unusual to find Climacostomum without algal endosymbionts (I see them quite often), but members of that genus always have a prominent vacuole in the posterior, with collecting ...

macnmotion wrote: ↑

Tue Jan 30, 2024 9:12 am

Do you get to name this species?

Only if our paper is accepted for publication.

A beautiful video. I don't think it is F. atra. It is not a very darkly pigmented cell, and lacks a distinctly pigmented anterior spot. I would suspect Frontonia angusta.

Those are gorgeous! They make me want to learn how to colorize images.

I noted to francisco and group, how I never encountered an amobae test with such' a dense/ thick fir' You've raised an interesting point, Charlie. In more than 10 years of cell-picking I must have looked at many thousands of individual arcellinids and I have to say...the shells of living specimens ...

Thanks, Francisco and hkv. They are truly amazing creatures!

Since its features are clear, it should be easy to ID You might think so. ;) We don't see the arrangement of ventral cirri clearly, but other features put it in the family Oxytrichidae. It is a compact cell, somewhat elongate, with two macronuclear nodules, enlarged, trailing transverse cirri, long...

Does your facility offer such pay for use of specific instruments? As far as I know the facility is only used by museum personnel and affiliated researchers. Access to the museum laboratories and collections seems to be controlled pretty carefully (key cards, government security checks etc.). As an...

A few more images. Like other members of its genus, Difflugia brevicolla builds its shell from found materials. This one has incorporated a diatom (center) and the cyst of a golden alga (spherical object, upper right). Difflugia brevicolla.jpg Arcella gibbosa : Arcella gibbosa.jpg And lastly, a clos...

Francisco wrote: ↑

Mon Jan 22, 2024 4:45 pm

Congratulations.
The images are spectacular.

Thanks, Francisco! I still have a lot to learn, but I've been pretty happy with the results, so far.

These are miraculous images. How on earth did you get them? The images were made on an Scanning Electron Microscope at a campus of the Canadian Museum of Nature in Gatineau, Quebec. Basically, I collected some nice shells, picked them out of the water with micropipettes, mounted them on aluminum "s...

Francisco wrote: ↑

Mon Jan 22, 2024 4:07 pm

Magnificent images.
Do you have an SEM?
Greetings

Greetings to you too, Francisco! I do not have an SEM, but I am able to use a very nice one at the Canadian Museum of Nature, where I am a Research Associate.

The discussion of Galeripora dentata on another thread prompted me to share a few images I've made of these lovely critters. Netzelia corona , from the Mer Bleue bog in Ottawa: Netzelia corona.jpg Lesquereusia gibbosa : lesquereusia gibbosa.jpg ...and Galeripora dentata , from a fen in the woods beh...

the individual I encountered manifested active vacuoles, Hi Charlie! Arcellid amoebae have the ability to form pockets of gas, which they use to right themselves when inverted or to relocate themselves by flotation. Here's a short paper describing the behaviour in Galeripora discoides (then known a...

Really nice video, Francisco! This species is now in the genus Galeripora.

It is not a ciliate, but a flatworm of some kind. The round structure appears to be a gravity-sensitive organ called a "statocyst," used for orientation (they are found in marine acoelomorphs, but I'm not sure what other groups might have them). I don't know much about animals, so I can't help with ...

Yes, exactly! S. roeselii in an early stage of division (vermiform macronucleus, no cortical pigments).

Very nice! If you're curious, the species is S. teres.

As WWWW says, it is a spathidiid (but not necessarily in genus Spathidium). Magnification and resolution are too low for identification to genus level.

On the basis of the cell shape, I think it's likely to be a species in the S. amphoriforme complex. It somewhat resembles S. securiforme (previously a variety of amphoriforme , elevated to species level in 2017). However, there really isn't much to go on, here, except for the coarse morphology. We d...

It's not a rotifer. It's a vaginicolid ciliate (Vaginicola, Cothurnia, etc.). We don't see the base of the base of the lorica, so I'm hesitant to propose a genus-level identification.

Thanks for fixing that link! On the other hand, it is a bit sad to know that, as an amateur, little can be done to identify the critters we see every day. We can still identify them...just not necessarily to species . ;) Even genus can be difficult in some groups. Since Vorticella was split in 1976,...

Identifying Paramecium species in the light microscope is actually quite difficult, and often impossible. At best, it requires a close inspection of features that are difficult to see, such as micronuclei and the pores of the contractile vacuole. Accurate measurements are also important, and multipl...

There are ciliates that form reproductive cysts, which are a little like egg sacks.

Yes, a ciliate feeding frenzy. The usual suspect in a scene of this kind would be a histophagous (tissue-eating) Tetrahymena.

Could you post video footage? It's hard to see what's going on in this image. The ratio of anterior cilia/polykinetids to body length would be unusual for Stentor (more like a choreotrich or peritrich, for instance...however, it is really hard to tell from what we see here). Does the .1 mm on your s...

Very nice! This is an Arcella in the hemisphaerica/rotundata/gibbosa complex.

Yes, Das Leben is a handy little guide. Keep in mind, though, that it shows only a tiny fraction of the real diversity in fresh water, and that the taxonomy is outdated. The same goes for most such "field guides," unfortunately.