Flagellate: Goniomonas

[janvangastel]

I found a nice flagellate. I never saw it before, but the water sample I explore at the moment is full of these smalle creatures. I think it is G. truncata. They are only 10 microns long and constantly moving around. Difficult to focus on, because they vibrate a little when they move. The dark line of black spots at the anterior consists are reflecting particles.

[Bruce Taylor]

A terrific record of an interesting flagellate! Goniomonas, certainly. The "reflecting particles" in that black line are ejectisomes--tiny weapons that fire proteinaceous strings for defense and/or predation. All cryptomonads have them. Differentiating species of Goniomonas by light microscopy is not reliable, but if this creature was found in freshwater we arrive at G. truncata by exclusion. The other species are recorded from marine environments, and there appears to be a deep divide between marine and freshwater members of the genus (von der Heyden et al., 2004).

[janvangastel]

Thanks Bruce. Good that I have the ID right. They are from a fresh water sample.

[KD Arvidsson]

Nice work Jan //KD

[janvangastel]

Thank you KD. I found this very small one, one of the most fascinating 'one cell creatures' I have observed.