in vivo

Description:

Portrait of the marine spirotrich ciliate Protocruzia granulosa (Kahl,1932) de Faria, da Cunha & Pinto, 1922. The cell is elongate and laterally compressed. The anterior ends in a short rostrum that bends slightly to the left. The posterior is bluntly tapered. The short, subapical anterior periostome has a prominent dense zone of membranelles. The somatic kineties are longitudinal. The cell is highly contractile as seen in this image with an extended individual on the viewer's left and a contracted cell on the right. Large food vacuoles are visible in the individual on the right. Collected from a commercial saltwater aquarium in Boise, Idaho May 2004. DIC optics.