Actinospaerium, coleps and gastrotrich

Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 11:52 pm

Wow... I was away for a week and there are so many excellent new shots posted... good to see them all!

I came across another interesting Actinospaerium. In the top image you can see a coleps in a vacuole at the outer edge.

The center shot is of a gastrotrich that ventured too close for too long. It is now struggling to escape. It was as if it were trapped in a clear elastic "bag".
After awhile it was obvious its situation was hopeless. Slowly the Actinospaerium drifted away while it encapsulated the gastrotrich into a tidy little vacuole. Dangerous little world out there.

20X, Canon 350D

100X, Canon 350D

40X, Canon 350D

Bruce Williams · Post by **Bruce Williams** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 2:14 am

An interesting and somewhat thought provoking series of images Charles. It's mind-numbing to think that, in the time it has taken me to type out this reply, countless billions of similar life and death dramas have played themselves out, unnoticed and forever unrecorded.

Bruce

Ken Ramos · Post by **Ken Ramos** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 3:35 am

Thought provoking images really. Being eaten alive would not be a very pleasant way to leave the present world in my opinion but then again how many of us would conisder dying as pleasant.

It makes one wonder if these organisms "feel" pain. They have no nervous system that I know of, at least not one that I am familar with, yet they respond to varioius forms of stimuli, having only a nucleus to control and manage what goes on within their unicellular structure. I wonder too, what triggers a feeding response within these things or all unicellular life forms such as protozoa, is their feeding at random, do they feel a need to capture prey at certain times or, as it so often appears, is feeding a glutonous and on going thing. Hmm...

I can relate to the last one.

Great shots as usual Charlie.

Adrian · Post by **Adrian** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 3:35 am

yes facinating, and with all those deaths it seems to spring new life,

same things can be seen in space..
with whole galaxies consuming eachother as if the smaller ones are food to the larger
and star's disastrous deaths consuming everything in there path yet to create the spawning grounds for future newborn life.

the universe is quite infinite

Ken Ramos · Post by **Ken Ramos** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 3:38 am

That too is a thought provoking idea Adrian. Wonder what lies on the other side of a "black hole," it has to come out somewhere...doesn't it? Well then again maybe not.

Adrian · Post by **Adrian** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 3:42 am

Ken Ramos wrote:Wonder what lies on the other side of a "black hole," it has to come out somewhere...doesn't it? Well then again maybe not.

i have no idea
but i think that it must have some purpose if it comes from nature?

Wim van Egmond · Post by **Wim van Egmond** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 10:07 am

Actinosphaerium is one of the giants of the microworld. Nice shots, Charles! They can catch quite big prey, rotifers etc. Did you see how the axiopods work? With the little blobs of protoplasm that move up and down.

Wim