Protista
By Bryce Lackey
Amoeba
The Amoeba is an animal-like protist that uses pseudopods to navigate through the water. This organism eats smaller organisms and plant cells. It eats by surrounding the bacteria or plant with it's pseudopods and it digests it with it's lysosomes. The Amoeba reproduces through Binary Fission, which is when it splits it's nucleus in two along with the cell itself. If there happens to be a drought in the pond, the amoeba will turn into a cyst, and stay there until the pond returns.
Amoeba eats two paramecia (Amoeba's lunch)
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Volvox
The Volvox is a plant-like organism that uses two flagella, on the top and bottom of the volvox, to move. Volvox live in colonies of 500-1500 volvox, this is why many people will classify volvox as multicellular organisms, although they are not. The volvox reproduces via Daughter Colonies, which lie inside the hollow volvox colony. The Volvox, like I mentioned earlier, is plant-like, so It uses photosynthesis to get it's food. The volvox live in colonies, which provides greater protection from animal-like protists.
Volvox Dances
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Euglena
The Euglena is another plant-like organism that uses a flagella to navigate the pond that it lives in. The euglena uses photosynthesis because it has chloroplast, so it will make it's own food, but on occasions where no light is present, it will absorb nutrients from the surrounding area. The Euglena reproduces through mitosis, which is when the cell splits in half. The Euglena has what is called an eyespot, which can detect light from across the pond, this is helpful because the euglena has chloroplasts.
Euglena - Flagellum movement in phase contrast
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Paramecium
The paramecium is an animal-like protist that uses tiny hair like apendages, known as cilia. The paramecium uses his oral groove to eat smaller protist and plants, he uses his cilia to push the food into the oral groove and down into his gullet. The paramecium will reproduce in two ways, either through asexual mitosis, or sexual conjunction. This is when two paramecia will transmit their DNA and will produce a baby, this is however not common and usually reproduce through mitosis.
Amazing Microscopic HD Video! Paramecium Feeding!!
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Conclussion
In conclussion, protists are very diverse and special and in each individual protist there is a special way they deal with different situations. Some will grow hard cysts, others will live in colonies to protect themselves from other protists. Protist are unique and amazing creatures.