portrait

Description:

Optical section (girdle view) of the pennate diatom, Cymatopleura solea (Brébisson) W. Smith 1851. Valves are elliptical with a central waist and bluntly pointed apices. The valve surface is marked with several transverse undulations best seen in girdle view (seen well in this image). Striae and undulations are not interrupted in the median axis. Raphe are marginal. Very short costations appear as beading around the edge of the valve. The central nucleus is seen in this image. There is a single lobulated plastid one half of which lies along the inner surface of the epivalve and the other along the inner surface of the hypovalve. Collected from the benthos of a freshwater pond near Boise, Idaho, January 2005. DIC.