Collection of live round Diatoms

[macnmotion]

In Bangkok, when water levels are high in local klongs (canals) the water constantly washes over the banks onto concrete walkways, resulting in algae growth. I scraped up some of the soaking wet algae and found it riddled with diatoms. Diatoms are microscopic single-cell algae with golden-brown chloroplasts and silica shells. This is a collection of separate focus stacks from the first two slides, imaged through a 40X oil immersion objective.

diatoms_sm.jpg (149.09 KiB) Viewed 365 times

[MichaelG.]

Nicely done
… and an important reminder that the pretty structures we usually admire are only their skeletal remains.

MichaelG.

[Phill Brown]

Excellent, thanks for sharing your find.