MicrobeHunter.com Microscopy Forum

Summary:

The present guide is an attempt to build a “bridge” between the general textbooks on protozoa and the guides to amoebae intended for specialists.

http://www.zin.ru/journals/protistology ... mirnov.pdf

Appreciated !

A very interesting article. I have read it, for the most part, yesterday. It says that to ID to the species to the genus and/or species level remains very difficult and more sophisticated research methods, including an electron microscope, will be needed than just observing the amoebe like we normally do under the microscope. According the the artcile, if I understood it well, is that the kind of observing we normally do is appropriate to ID to the level of the morphological type of amoebe.

I think as amateurs, some of us, and I include myself, are guilty of simplifying the identification process of organisms.

We depend far to much on images posted on the internet that look like or are similar to what we have seen.

We ignore that the original ID may well be wrong, and that every wrong ID based on it just exacerbates the problem.

We also ignore that though the ID we are basing our identification on may well be right, there many different species that qualify as similar looking to the unpracticed eye.

Proper identification many times requires a slow step by step approach, as each box ticked presents us with a new fork in the road.

Knowing what features are characteristic and being able to distinguish them is half the battle.

If photographing or videoing, care must be taken to capture these features so that subsequent efforts at an identification,

taken at leisure with a coffee or whiskey to hand, have a better chance of being at least a partial success.

The whiskey part of the identification process appeals to me.