75 posts · 58,909 views

Undergratuate hoping to someday study cell biology and development of various unicellular protists. Currently working on plant development, as well as exploring some evolution of biological, as well as cultural and linguistic, organisms as a hobby on the side. Considers public outreach of science to be crucial to both research funding and research progress itself, as teaching and learning are highly dependent on one another. Hopes to improve own communication skills via blogging. Wonders why she is referring to self in third person...

Skeptic Wonder
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April 25, 2010
08:28 AM
2,818 views

Social onychophorans!

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

As much as I'm obsessed with protists, I'm a rather promiscuous type when it comes to academic relationships, and thus can find the occasional non-protist cute and interesting. Forgive me if that is 'immoral', but I'm not Christian and thus am not obligated to be intellectually monogamous. So there.Onychophorans (velvet worms) are fucking adorable. Now, whether they are more or less adorable than, say, hypotrich ciliates or Apusomonas proboscidea, is open to debate (I remain loyal to my tribal a........ Read more »

Dias, S., & Lo-Man-Hung, N. (2009) First record of an onychophoran (Onychophora, Peripatidae) feeding on a theraphosid spider (Araneae, Theraphosidae). Journal of Arachnology, 37(1), 116-117. DOI: 10.1636/ST08-20.1

Mayer, G., & Harzsch, S. (2007) Immunolocalization of serotonin in Onychophora argues against segmental ganglia being an ancestral feature of arthropods. BMC Evolutionary Biology, 7(1), 118. DOI: 10.1186/1471-2148-7-118

Mayer, G., & Whitington, P. (2009) Neural development in Onychophora (velvet worms) suggests a step-wise evolution of segmentation in the nervous system of Panarthropoda. Developmental Biology, 335(1), 263-275. DOI: 10.1016/j.ydbio.2009.08.011

Reinhard, J., & Rowell, D. (2005) Social behaviour in an Australian velvet worm, Euperipatoides rowelli (Onychophora: Peripatopsidae). Journal of Zoology, 267(01), 1. DOI: 10.1017/S0952836905007090

November 27, 2009
06:44 AM
1,424 views

Heterolobosea II - 'Split Morphology Disorder': amoebo-flagellate transformation in Naegleria

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Earlier, in Heterolobosea I, I promised brain-eating amoebae with a split morphology disorder. Having a bit of a morphology fetish, I find the latter topic fascinating, so bear with me as we get into some gory details of cell biology, which I strive to make at least somewhat readable to sane human beings. As always, please let me know if anything is unclear, or *gasp* inaccurate...Fundamentals of cellular morphologyMost organisms strive to have some semblance of shape (including bacteria). To cr........ Read more »

Dingle AD, & Fulton C. (1966) Development of the flagellar apparatus of Naegleria. The Journal of cell biology, 31(1), 43-54. PMID: 5971974

Fulton C, & Walsh C. (1980) Cell differentiation and flagellar elongation in Naegleria gruberi. Dependence on transcription and translation. The Journal of cell biology, 85(2), 346-60. PMID: 6154711

González-Robles, A., Cristóbal-Ramos, A., González-Lázaro, M., Omaña-Molina, M., & Martínez-Palomo, A. (2009) Naegleria fowleri: Light and electron microscopy study of mitosis. Experimental Parasitology, 122(3), 212-217. DOI: 10.1016/j.exppara.2009.03.016

Outka DE, & Kluss BC. (1967) The ameba-to-flagellate transformation in Tetramitus rostratus. II. Microtubular morphogenesis. The Journal of cell biology, 35(2), 323-46. PMID: 4861775

WALSH, C. (2007) The role of actin, actomyosin and microtubules in defining cell shape during the differentiation of Naegleria amebae into flagellates. European Journal of Cell Biology, 86(2), 85-98. DOI: 10.1016/j.ejcb.2006.10.003

October 5, 2009
05:20 AM
1,296 views

Sunday Protist - Euglyphids

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

I'm going to be lazy and leech off the Mystery Micrograph again. None of you saner people (non-protistgeeks) seem to have taken advantage of the massive handicap, and subsequent hint. Seriously, type in "testate amoebae" in Google image search, and it's on the first page! Perhaps I should do a tutorial on some methods of attacking those mystery images...Quite shockingly(not!), Opisthokont got the last one. I agree with his statement that that was like shooting fish in a barrel, but easier since ........ Read more »

BODYL, A., MACKIEWICZ, P., & STILLER, J. (2007) The intracellular cyanobacteria of Paulinella chromatophora: endosymbionts or organelles?. Trends in Microbiology, 15(7), 295-296. DOI: 10.1016/j.tim.2007.05.002

Javaux EJ. (2007) The early eukaryotic fossil record. Advances in experimental medicine and biology, 1-19. PMID: 17977455

Keeling, P. (2004) Diversity and evolutionary history of plastids and their hosts. American Journal of Botany, 91(10), 1481-1493. DOI: 10.3732/ajb.91.10.1481

KEELING, P., & ARCHIBALD, J. (2008) Organelle Evolution: What's in a Name?. Current Biology, 18(8). DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2008.02.065

LARA, E., HEGER, T., MITCHELL, E., MEISTERFELD, R., & EKELUND, F. (2007) SSU rRNA Reveals a Sequential Increase in Shell Complexity Among the Euglyphid Testate Amoebae (Rhizaria: Euglyphida). Protist, 158(2), 229-237. DOI: 10.1016/j.protis.2006.11.006

NOWACK, E., MELKONIAN, M., & GLOCKNER, G. (2008) Chromatophore Genome Sequence of Paulinella Sheds Light on Acquisition of Photosynthesis by Eukaryotes. Current Biology, 18(6), 410-418. DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2008.02.051

THEISSEN, U., & MARTIN, W. (2006) The difference between organelles and endosymbionts. Current Biology, 16(24). DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2006.11.020

Yoon, H., Reyes-Prieto, A., Melkonian, M., & Bhattacharya, D. (2006) Minimal plastid genome evolution in the Paulinella endosymbiont. Current Biology, 16(17). DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2006.08.018

November 4, 2009
07:17 AM
1,133 views

MM#07 Answer: Haplosporidia -- spores with lids

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Johan, our resident micropaleontologist, got this past week's Mystery Micrograph - congratulations! The answer was: Haplosporidia. Johan went the extra mile and identified its genus: Minchinia. This one is M.mercenariae, from Ford et al. 2009 JEM:Minchinia mercenariae (Haplosporidian) from the clam Mercenaria mercenaria; 13 - SEM of spore with arrow pointing to the opening; 12 - spore with a closed hinged lid; 2 - Minchinia's 'habitat' in the clam connective tissue (which it has taken over), whi........ Read more »

Azevedo, C. (1984) Ultrastructure of the Spore of Haplosporidium lusitanicum sp. n. (Haplosporida, Haplosporidiidae), Parasite of a Marine Mollusc. The Journal of Parasitology, 70(3), 358. DOI: 10.2307/3281564

AZEVEDO, C., BALSEIRO, P., CASAL, G., GESTAL, C., ARANGUREN, R., STOKES, N., CARNEGIE, R., NOVOA, B., BURRESON, E., & FIGUERAS, A. (2006) Ultrastructural and molecular characterization of Haplosporidium montforti n. sp., parasite of the European abalone Haliotis tuberculata. Journal of Invertebrate Pathology, 92(1), 23-32. DOI: 10.1016/j.jip.2006.02.002

Azevedo, C., Casal, G., & Montes, J. (2008) Ultrastructural Developmental Cycle of Haplosporidium montforti (Phylum Haplosporidia) in its Farmed Abalone Host, Haliotis tuberculata (Gastropoda). Journal of Parasitology, 94(1), 137-142. DOI: 10.1645/GE-1177.1

Cavalier-Smith, T., & Chao, E. (2003) Phylogeny of Choanozoa, Apusozoa, and Other Protozoa and Early Eukaryote Megaevolution. Journal of Molecular Evolution, 56(5), 540-563. DOI: 10.1007/s00239-002-2424-z

FORD, S., STOKES, N., BURRESON, E., SCARPA, E., CARNEGIE, R., KRAEUTER, J., & BUSHEK, D. (2009) Minchinia mercenariae n. sp. (Haplosporidia) in the Hard Clam Mercenaria mercenaria Implications of a Rare Parasite in a Commercially Important Host . Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 56(6), 542-551. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2009.00432.x

July 21, 2009
04:24 AM
1,121 views

Sunday Protist - Dinoflagellate eats Chaetoceros (gory) (for real this time!)

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

(Yesterday's attempts were derailed by having to shred some New Age BS instead)The media seems to be obsessed with posting pictures/videos of things eating things; apparently that generates a lot of revenue interest. Since I'm neck deep in syntactic trees and X-bar theory (Yes, I voluntarily, by my own will, as an elective, take third year syntax & grammar courses. Also, I dislike Chomsky. Clearly, I am very sane), I'm going to resort to posting gory pictures: (and yes, I mixed up Chaetoce........ Read more »

Jacobson, D., & Anderson, D. (1986) THECATE HETEROPHIC DINOFLAGELLATES: FEEDING BEHAVIOR AND MECHANISMS. Journal of Phycology, 22(3), 249-258. DOI: 10.1111/j.1529-8817.1986.tb00021.x

Jacobson, D., & Anderson, D. (1992) ULTRASTRUCTURE OF THE FEEDING APPARATUS AND MYONEMAL SYSTEM OF THE HETEROTROPHIC DINOFLAGELLATE PROTOPERIDINIUM SPINULOSUM1. Journal of Phycology, 28(1), 69-82. DOI: 10.1111/j.0022-3646.1992.00069.x

September 12, 2009
09:45 PM
1,108 views

A quick note on flagella, and their evolution

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

First off, 'flagella' and 'cilia' tend to be used interchangeably. I prefer to call them flagella, out of habit, but there's some who argue 'flagellum' should be reserved for bacteria, who have a fundamentally different system from us; while we have 'cilia'. Another note: 'flagella' is spelled with two l's, 'cilia' with one. Took me about two months of protistology to learn that. (also, I consistently spelled 'axopodia' as 'auxopodia', thanks to a plant biology research background. Curse you, au........ Read more »

Roger, A., & Simpson, A. (2009) Evolution: Revisiting the Root of the Eukaryote Tree. Current Biology, 19(4). DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2008.12.032

WALKER, G., DACKS, J., & MARTIN EMBLEY, T. (2006) Ultrastructural Description of Breviata anathema, N. Gen., N. Sp., the Organism Previously Studied as "Mastigamoeba invertens". The Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 53(2), 65-78. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2005.00087.x

July 15, 2009
08:52 AM
1,107 views

"Sunday" Protist - Trichonympha returns!

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Finally published today: Extreme Trichonympha sexiness:(Carpenter, Chow and Keeling 2009. Morphology, Phylogeny, and Diversity of Trichonympha (Parabasalia: Hypermastigida) of the Wood-Feeding Cockroach Cryptocercus punctulatus. J Euk Microbiol 56:305-313I stole these while the manuscript was in advance online publication, before the images were shrunk and butchered to fit print quality:The little rod shaped things in 12-15 are some bacteria on the posterior end of the cell. 26-28 - after removi........ Read more »

CARPENTER, K., CHOW, L., & KEELING, P. (2009) Morphology, Phylogeny, and Diversity of Trichonympha(Parabasalia: Hypermastigida) of the Wood-Feeding Cockroach Cryptocercus punctulatus . Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 56(4), 305-313. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2009.00406.x

October 26, 2009
04:48 AM
1,059 views

Sunday Protist - Nucleariids

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

While exploring the various corners of the protistan world, I've been neglecting our close relatives - the Opisthokonts. Let's quickly remedy the situation.A couple weekends ago I had some pond water on hand, and it turned out to be quite productive. I was on a bit of a heliozoan and amoeba spree when I encountered these things:At first it seemed like a 'heliozoan'*, but wasn't quite round enough. Then I noticed filopodia. Heliozoa with filopodia? Nah. But it didn't quite qualify for your typica........ Read more »

Brown, M., Spiegel, F., & Silberman, J. (2009) Phylogeny of the "forgotten" cellular slime mold, Fonticula alba, reveals a key evolutionary branch within Opisthokonta. Molecular Biology and Evolution. DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msp185

RUIZTRILLO, I., BURGER, G., HOLLAND, P., KING, N., LANG, B., ROGER, A., & GRAY, M. (2007) The origins of multicellularity: a multi-taxon genome initiative. Trends in Genetics, 23(3), 113-118. DOI: 10.1016/j.tig.2007.01.005

October 19, 2009
06:26 AM
1,046 views

Sunday Protist - Diplonemids: Metaboly without a pellicle and the dawn of kDNA?

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Took you guys a while to get the past Mystery Micrograph, which gave me ample excuses to procrastinate with last week's Sunday Protist. Of course, no one noticed, so it's all good, right? Opisthokont finally got it after every single other discicristate lineage has been eliminated, and grotesquely revealing hints have been given away. Johan guessed their sister clade, Kinetoplastida. More importantly, we need fresh blood on this blog, and thus far, the Mystery Micrograph winners have been an inc........ Read more »

Leander, B., Witek, R., & Farmer, M. (2001) TRENDS IN THE EVOLUTION OF THE EUGLENID PELLICLE. Evolution, 55(11), 2215. DOI: 10.1554/0014-3820(2001)055[2215:TITEOT]2.0.CO;2

Marande, W., Lukes, J., & Burger, G. (2005) Unique Mitochondrial Genome Structure in Diplonemids, the Sister Group of Kinetoplastids. Eukaryotic Cell, 4(6), 1137-1146. DOI: 10.1128/EC.4.6.1137-1146.2005

ROY, J., FAKTOROVÁ, D., BENADA, O., LUKEŠ, J., & BURGER, G. (2007) Description of Rhynchopus euleeides n. sp. (Diplonemea), a Free-Living Marine Euglenozoan. The Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 54(2), 137-145. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2007.00244.x

Roy, J., Faktorová, D., Lukeš, J., & Burger, G. (2007) Unusual Mitochondrial Genome Structures throughout the Euglenozoa. Protist, 158(3), 385-396. DOI: 10.1016/j.protis.2007.03.002

Simpson AG, Lukes J, & Roger AJ. (2002) The evolutionary history of kinetoplastids and their kinetoplasts. Molecular biology and evolution, 19(12), 2071-83. PMID: 12446799

SIMPSON, A. (2004) Early Evolution within Kinetoplastids (Euglenozoa), and the Late Emergence of Trypanosomatids. Protist, 155(4), 407-422. DOI: 10.1078/1434461042650389

STURM, N., MASLOV, D., GRISARD, E., & CAMPBELL, D. (2001) Diplonema spp. Possess Spliced Leader RNA Genes Similar to the Kinetoplastida. The Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 48(3), 325-331. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2001.tb00321.x

SWALE, E. (1973) A study of the colourless flagellate Rhynchomonas nasuta (Stokes) Klebs. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 5(3), 255-264. DOI: 10.1111/j.1095-8312.1973.tb00705.x

VICKERMAN, K. (1977) DNA Throughout the Single Mitochondrion of a Kinetoplastid Flagellate: Observations on the Ultrastructure of Cryptobia vaginalis (Hesse, 1910). The Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 24(2), 221-233. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.1977.tb00970.x

September 19, 2009
05:06 AM
1,044 views

'Crhaptophytes' and the Chromalveolate Hypothesis

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Procrastination with about a million things (including overdue blog posts) is the perfect time to blog a freshly published paper. Although I can't quite figure out how to make the preceding sentence make any sense syntactically...Warning: This post contains copious amounts of obscure phylogeny and taxonomy. Discussed by a cell biologist. Proceed with caution.I've probably carelessly alluded before to the Chromalveolate Hypothesis by Cavalier-Smith (eg. 2002 Curr Biol). In any case, I tend to go ........ Read more »

Moore, R., Oborník, M., Janouškovec, J., Chrudimský, T., Vancová, M., Green, D., Wright, S., Davies, N., Bolch, C., Heimann, K.... (2008) A photosynthetic alveolate closely related to apicomplexan parasites. Nature, 451(7181), 959-963. DOI: 10.1038/nature06635

Cavalier-Smith, T. (2002) Chloroplast Evolution: Secondary Symbiogenesis and Multiple Losses. Current Biology, 12(2). DOI: 10.1016/S0960-9822(01)00675-3

KEELING, P., BURGER, G., DURNFORD, D., LANG, B., LEE, R., PEARLMAN, R., ROGER, A., & GRAY, M. (2005) The tree of eukaryotes. Trends in Ecology , 20(12), 670-676. DOI: 10.1016/j.tree.2005.09.005

KEELING, P. (2009) Chromalveolates and the Evolution of Plastids by Secondary Endosymbiosis. Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 56(1), 1-8. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2008.00371.x

Okamoto, N., Chantangsi, C., Horák, A., Leander, B., & Keeling, P. (2009) Molecular Phylogeny and Description of the Novel Katablepharid Roombia truncata gen. et sp. nov., and Establishment of the Hacrobia Taxon nov. PLoS ONE, 4(9). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0007080

REYESPRIETO, A., MOUSTAFA, A., & BHATTACHARYA, D. (2008) Multiple Genes of Apparent Algal Origin Suggest Ciliates May Once Have Been Photosynthetic. Current Biology, 18(13), 956-962. DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2008.05.042

August 18, 2009
05:27 AM
1,037 views

The Myth of Evolutionary Ascent

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Many physicists whine about the public's grotesque misunderstanding of basic concepts like centripetal force and electromagnetism. Some of those very physicists often like to consider biology to be a simple subject, delivering profound lines like "people still study evolution???". Of course, how can anyone have any problems understanding something that barely uses any formulas! Of all sciences, biology uses the smallest portion of the Greek alphabet, and hasn't even moved on to Hebrew yet. How c........ Read more »

DC Dennett. (1995) Darwin's Dangerous Idea. Darwin's Dangerous Idea. info:/

Collins RA, & Lambowitz AM. (1985) RNA splicing in Neurospora mitochondria. Defective splicing of mitochondrial mRNA precursors in the nuclear mutant cyt18-1. Journal of molecular biology, 184(3), 413-28. PMID: 2413216

LEANDER, B. (2008) Different modes of convergent evolution reflect phylogenetic distances: a reply to Arendt and Reznick. Trends in Ecology , 23(9), 481-482. DOI: 10.1016/j.tree.2008.04.012

LEANDER, B. (2008) A Hierarchical View of Convergent Evolution in Microbial Eukaryotes. The Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 55(2), 59-68. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2008.00308.x

SLAMOVITS, C., & KEELING, P. (2008) Widespread recycling of processed cDNAs in dinoflagellates. Current Biology, 18(13). DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2008.04.054

Stoltzfus, A. (1999) On the Possibility of Constructive Neutral Evolution. Journal of Molecular Evolution, 49(2), 169-181. DOI: 10.1007/PL00006540

September 11, 2009
03:45 AM
1,023 views

Finger-growing dinoflagellate (cute!)

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Why must I spoil the plot by peeking into advance online publications instead of waiting for the damn issue to come out, like normal people do? Especially with an 8am class coming up so soon...Anyway, apparently Ceratium ranipes, a photosynthetic dinoflagellate, decided to grow plastid-stuffed 'fingers' during daylight:(Pizay et al. 2009 Protist, in press; light period)And retracts them back in for the night:(Pizay et al. 2009 Protist, in press; dark period)In case you're not convinced these are........ Read more »

Pizay, M., Lemée, R., Simon, N., Cras, A., Laugier, J., & Dolan, J. (2009) Night and Day Morphologies in a Planktonic Dinoflagellate. Protist. DOI: 10.1016/j.protis.2009.04.003

August 2, 2009
11:46 PM
1,014 views

Sunday Protist - Obscure Phaeodarian: Coelodiceras

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Choreocolax and Ecomonymopha not obscure enough? Let's go for Phaeodaria then! I've been neglecting Rhizarians, just like everyone else. When I first saw a eukaryotic tree, I could recognise a thing or two in most of the 'kingdoms'. Except one: Rhizaria. All those names were absolutely meaningless to me. Those wonderful earthly aliens desperately need an introduction to the world beyond dusty 1970's oceonography journals!Rhizarian taxonomy (nitpicky detail alert)Rhizaria is a very morphologicall........ Read more »

Schwartz, W. (1968) Dogiel, V. A., General Protozoology. Revised by J. L. Poljanskij and E. M. Chejsin (II. Auflage) VII und 747 S., 326 Abb. Oxford 1965: Clarendon Press 7 s, 7 £. Zeitschrift für allgemeine Mikrobiologie, 8(4), 332-332. DOI: 10.1002/jobm.3630080414

PATERSON, H., PESANT, S., CLODE, P., KNOTT, B., & WAITE, A. (2007) Systematics of a rare radiolarian—Coelodiceras spinosum Haecker (Sarcodina: Actinopoda: Phaeodaria: Coelodendridae). Deep Sea Research Part II: Topical Studies in Oceanography, 54(8-10), 1094-1102. DOI: 10.1016/j.dsr2.2006.05.046

PAWLOWSKI, J., & BURKI, F. (2009) Untangling the Phylogeny of Amoeboid Protists. Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 56(1), 16-25. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2008.00379.x

February 9, 2010
05:56 AM
978 views

ToE Expansion pack: Foraminifera!

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

After getting over my little moment of rage there, I decided to go ahead and redo the forams while I could still vaguely remember the phylogeny, sort of. So here comes the Tree of Eukaryotes Expansion Pack: Forams!I hope somebody is happy now, after nagging me about the freaking forams for the past two weeks! I know they deserve more space, and I did them an awful injustice by shrinking the entire group to just 'Forams'. Since I still haven't figured out the space problem (should I just shrink e........ Read more »

Flakowski, J. (2005) ACTIN PHYLOGENY OF FORAMINIFERA. The Journal of Foraminiferal Research, 35(2), 93-102. DOI: 10.2113/35.2.93

HABURA, A., GOLDSTEIN, S., PARFREY, L., & BOWSER, S. (2006) Phylogeny and Ultrastructure of Miliammina fusca: Evidence for Secondary Loss of Calcification in a Miliolid Foraminifer. The Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 53(3), 204-210. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2006.00096.x

LONGET, D., & PAWLOWSKI, J. (2007) Higher-level phylogeny of Foraminifera inferred from the RNA polymerase II (RPB1) gene. European Journal of Protistology, 43(3), 171-177. DOI: 10.1016/j.ejop.2007.01.003

Pawlowski, J. (2003) The evolution of early Foraminifera. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 100(20), 11494-11498. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2035132100

August 17, 2009
05:22 AM
972 views

Sunday Protist - Streblomastix: intestinal torpedo-bearing sub

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Taking a bit of a break from Rhizaria... haven't done Excavates in a while. From one obscure 'kingdom' to another... (although now I have this nagging feeling that I'm really neglecting unikonts - I haven't done amoebozoa or opisthokonts in ages...)And the creature behind (or rather, containing) Mystery Micrograph #01 is...(Leander & Keeling 2004 J Euk Microbiol; scalebar=5μm)Streblomastix strix, an oxymonad. 2 - cross-sectionRosie more or less got this one ^.^ (I guess one can't really exp........ Read more »

LEANDER, B., & KEELING, P. (2004) Symbiotic Innovation in the Oxymonad Streblomastix strix. The Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 51(3), 291-300. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.2004.tb00569.x

Poinar GO. (2009) Description of an early Cretaceous termite (Isoptera: Kalotermitidae) and its associated intestinal protozoa, with comments on their co-evolution. Parasites and Vectors, 12. info:/10.1186/1756-3305-2-12

August 24, 2009
08:01 AM
963 views

Sunday Protist - Perkinsela: Life as an organelle

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

We've all heard of the primary endosymbiosis of bacteria that eventually became mitochondria* and plastids, on two separate occasions (three if you count Paulinella plastid origin). Some have heard of secondary, and maybe even tertiary, plastid endosymbiosis (eg. brown algae with red algal plastids). There's a fascinating case of tertiary endosymbiosis where an entire diatom inhabiting a dino (Kryptoperidinium), etc. Another interesting phenomenon is the endosymbiosis resulting in other essentia........ Read more »

DYKOVA, I. (2003) -like endosymbionts of spp., relatives of the kinetoplastid. European Journal of Protistology, 39(1), 37-52. DOI: 10.1078/0932-4739-00901

DYKOVA, I., FIALA, I., DVORAKOVA, H., & PECKOVA, H. (2008) Living together: The marine amoeba Thecamoeba hilla Schaeffer, 1926 and its endosymbiont Labyrinthula sp. European Journal of Protistology, 44(4), 308-316. DOI: 10.1016/j.ejop.2008.04.001

DYKOVA, I., FIALA, I., & PECKOVA, H. (2008) Neoparamoeba spp. and their eukaryotic endosymbionts similar to Perkinsela amoebae (Hollande, 1980): Coevolution demonstrated by SSU rRNA gene phylogenies. European Journal of Protistology, 44(4), 269-277. DOI: 10.1016/j.ejop.2008.01.004

Liu, B., Liu, Y., Motyka, S., Agbo, E., & Englund, P. (2005) Fellowship of the rings: the replication of kinetoplast DNA. Trends in Parasitology, 21(8), 363-369. DOI: 10.1016/j.pt.2005.06.008

Lovy J, Becker JA, Speare DJ, Wadowska DW, Wright GM, & Powell MD. (2007) Ultrastructural examination of the host cellular response in the gills of Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar, with amoebic gill disease. Veterinary pathology, 44(5), 663-71. PMID: 17846238

SIMPSON, A., STEVENS, J., & LUKES, J. (2006) The evolution and diversity of kinetoplastid flagellates. Trends in Parasitology, 22(4), 168-174. DOI: 10.1016/j.pt.2006.02.006

YOUNG, N., CROSBIE, P., ADAMS, M., NOWAK, B., & MORRISON, R. (2007) Neoparamoeba perurans n. sp., an agent of amoebic gill disease of Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar)☆. International Journal for Parasitology, 37(13), 1469-1481. DOI: 10.1016/j.ijpara.2007.04.018

September 22, 2009
06:00 AM
951 views

Sunday Protist - Haptoglossa: Missile-growing spores

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

I totally just skipped a week, I know. But no one really noticed, right? Good! ^.^ Kind of busy with classes, setting up a seminar course, and...much neglected research. I'm beginning to forget to do treatments and such, too much stuff going on. Also, training new undergrads is a lot of work. Especially when they show up at various random times and you forget what you've explained to whom. And when they forget certain important details that you've spent a good 15min elaborating on, complete with........ Read more »

Barron, G. (1987) The Gun Cell of Haptoglossa mirabilis. Mycologia, 79(6), 877. DOI: 10.2307/3807689

Hakariya, M., Hirose, D., & Tokumasu, S. (2007) A molecular phylogeny of Haptoglossa species, terrestrial peronosporomycetes (oomycetes) endoparasitic on nematodes. Mycoscience, 48(3), 169-175. DOI: 10.1007/s10267-007-0355-7

Glockling, S. (2000) An Ultrastructural Study of Sporidium Formation during Infection of a Rhabditid Nematode by Large Gun Cells of Haptoglossa heteromorpha. Journal of Invertebrate Pathology, 76(3), 208-215. DOI: 10.1006/jipa.2000.4967

Glockling, S., & Beakes, G. (2000) Video Microscopy of Spore Development in Haptoglossa heteromorpha, a New Species from Cow Dung. Mycologia, 92(4), 747. DOI: 10.2307/3761431

Glockling, S. (2002) Ultrastructural morphogenesis of dimorphic arcuate infection (gun) cells of Haptoglossa erumpens an obligate parasite of Bunonema nematodes. Fungal Genetics and Biology, 37(3), 250-262. DOI: 10.1016/S1087-1845(02)00532-7

ROBB, E., & BARRON, G. (1982) Nature's Ballistic Missile. Science, 218(4578), 1221-1222. DOI: 10.1126/science.218.4578.1221

November 2, 2009
06:17 AM
949 views

Sunday Protist - Scenedesmus: Of coenobia and cell cycles

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Busy starting working on slides for a lab meeting talk tomorrow, so today's Sunday Protist will be very brief and undetailed. And thoroughly uninformative. For real this time. Seriously, I say this every freaking time and end up writing a minireview on the damn thing... it's just so damn alluring to go and read up random stuff on these organisms!We've been ignoring Archaeplastids again. Here, have some Scenedesmus:Scenedesmus dimorphus(?) 40x obj, DICOk, my images are shitty (damn thing is motil........ Read more »

ZACHLEDER, V., BI??OV??, K., V??TOV??, M., KUB??N, ?., & HENDRYCHOV??, J. (2002) Variety of cell cycle patterns in the alga Scenedesmus quadricauda (Chlorophyta) as revealed by application of illumination regimes and inhibitors. European Journal of Phycology, 37(3), 361-371. DOI: 10.1017/S0967026202003815

Pickett-Heaps, J., & Staehelin, L. (1975) THE ULTRASTRUCTURE OF SCENEDESMUS (CHLOROPHYCEAE). II. CELL DIVISION AND COLONY FORMATION1. Journal of Phycology, 11(2), 186-202. DOI: 10.1111/j.0022-3646.1975.00186.x

July 13, 2010
08:41 AM
938 views

Sunday Protist - Giant tree of spicules: Spiculidendron

by Psi Wavefunction in Skeptic Wonder

Christopher Taylor over at Catalogue of Organisms has a nice post on agglutinated Saccamminid foraminifera, and very recently wrote on the taxonomy and morphology of Pelosina, Pilulina and Technitella, wherein he brought up a fascinating paper on one hell of a bizarre foram: the 'spicule tree', initally mistaken for a gorgonian (sea fan). I'm going to leech off his find as he didn't specifically mention this tree foram in his post. Also, he mentioned Komokians before I did. Meanie. In all seriou........ Read more »

Rützler, K., & Richardson, S. (1996) The Caribbean spicule tree: a sponge-imitating foraminifer (Astrorhizidae). Bulletin de l'Institut Royal des Sciences Naturelles de Belgique 66 (Suppl.), 143-151. info:/

Bowser, S. (2002) RETICULOPODIA: STRUCTURAL AND BEHAVIORAL BASIS FOR THE SUPRAGENERIC PLACEMENT OF GRANULORETICULOSAN PROTISTS. The Journal of Foraminiferal Research, 32(4), 440-447. DOI: 10.2113/0320440

BOWSER, S. (1985) Invasive Activity of Allogromia Pseudopodial Networks: Skyllocytosis of a Gelatin/Agar Gel. The Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology, 32(1), 9-12. DOI: 10.1111/j.1550-7408.1985.tb03005.x

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