Frontonia atra.

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Plasmid
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Frontonia atra.

#1 Post by Plasmid » Sat Feb 13, 2021 11:04 pm

I could only imagine how it would had looked through some apochromats




Bruce Taylor
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Joined: Fri Sep 04, 2015 11:34 am

Re: Frontonia atra.

#2 Post by Bruce Taylor » Sun Feb 14, 2021 1:23 am

I like the illumination! This is probably Ophryoglena atra, not Frontonia. We don't see the 6-shaped mouth that would confirm Ophryoglena, but the combination of a long macronucleus and very dark cytoplasm is pretty distinctive (Frontonia would have a more compact macronucleus, and the body would be flattened with a somewhat pointed posterior). This is a dividing cell, of course.

sinabro
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Re: Frontonia atra.

#3 Post by sinabro » Sun Feb 14, 2021 5:20 am

Very nice vid!
Bruce, You are amazing.

eward1897
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Joined: Sun Nov 03, 2019 4:49 am

Re: Frontonia atra.

#4 Post by eward1897 » Mon Feb 15, 2021 5:00 pm

Who would have thought protists were susceptible to childbirth tragedy? She was about to become twin daughters and now everyone is dead.

Does anyone know if protists are extra susceptible to mortality during division? Or maybe this death was from another cause such as being squashed by coverslip or osmotic shift during slide preparation. I noticed the contractile vacuoles were working very quickly just before loss of cell membrane integrity.

Ed in Minnesota

Bruce Taylor
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Re: Frontonia atra.

#5 Post by Bruce Taylor » Tue Feb 16, 2021 1:18 pm

eward1897 wrote:
Mon Feb 15, 2021 5:00 pm
Does anyone know if protists are extra susceptible to mortality during division?
It's not something I've ever noticed. Ciliates in fission seem to be as robust as any others (in my experience, at least). Spontaneous failure of membranes occurs frequently in some groups, and rarely in others. I've seen Loxodes and certain dileptids explode after simply touching an air bubble. Paramecium, on the other hand, can endure a remarkable amount of abuse without falling to pieces (though osmotic bloating can be an issue, for them!). Some ciliates can regenerate parts of themselves after a disfiguring accident (if you have steady hands and the right equipment you can even do "surgery" on some ciliates, removing organelles, etc.). Others just seems to dissolve as soon as soon as the cortex is ruptured.

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