amoeba blog

One of the most enigmatic microscopic life forms is the amoeba. Almost everyone knows what amoeba are, which is quite remarkable since they are not that common. Microorganisms like rotifers are much easier to find but drop the name 'rotifer' in a conversation and most people will not know what you are talking about. But mention the word 'amoeba' and people will say: 'Yes, you mean those critters that can take any shape they like!'
They are legendary as the ultimate 'shape shifters'. Despite their good publicity they remain much of a mystery. It is even quite hard to find them. They are easily overlooked since they are so transparent or not recognized as living organisms since they often resemble decaying organic remains.

Some time ago I was asked if I could produce a series of images of microorganisms such as the Hydra, Paramecium and an Amoeba. I had to confess that I had never photographed an amoeba. So I tried to find out how to catch them. I read about the following method: Hold a jar upside down under water until it is situated just above the bottom of a pond. Then slowly tilt the jar to let the air escape. This way the top layer of the soil on the bottom of the pond will be sucked inside the jar. Many amoebas inhabit this top layer of decaying organic material.

cell membrane - the thin layer of protein and fat that surrounds the amoeba; it allows some substances to pass into the cell, and blocks other substances.
contractile vacuole - a cavity within the amoeba that excretes excess water and waste; the waste is brought to the cell membrane and is then eliminated from the amoeba.
cytoplasm - a jelly-like material that fills most of the cell; the organelles (like the nucleus) are surrounded by cytoplasm.
food vacuole - a cavity within the amoeba in which food is digested (broken down in order to be absorbed by the amoeba).
food being engulfed by pseudopods - the amoeba "eats" by surrounding bits of food with pseudopods that form around the food; the amoeba then incorporates the food into the cell, forming a food vacuole.
nucleus - the major organelle of the amoeba, located centrally; it controls reproduction (it contains the chromosomes) and many other important functions (including eating and growth).
pseudopods - temporary "feet" that the amoeba uses to move around and to engulf food.

Why We Believe in Creation, Not in Evolution (this one should get you!)

THE SINGLE-CELLED AMOEBA WITNESSES FOR CHRIST, As do all of the Other
20,000 Protozoa.
Each one of these 20,000 forms of minute life (protozoa) has its own
individuality! For instance, whereas the amoebae gets around by a peculiar
amoeboid movement-projecting a pseudopodia (false foot) from any part of
its body the paramecium swims around by means of about 2500 cilia (short
hairs) that cover its body.
Could any two forms of life, at least in regard to means of locomotion, be
more dissimilar? Which evolved from which? And if they didn¹t evolve from
each other but are cousins that evolved from the same ancestor as some
evolutionists say, what was that common ancestor? They are both protozoa.
The amoeba has some striking characteristics that demand special creation.
It can crawl by means of projecting its pseudo-pods; it can project a
pseudopod at any point of its minute body; it projects its body at any
point to absorb foods it eats, having no mouth; and it breathes, though it
has neither gills nor lungs. It has no brain, yet it can distinguish inert
particles from the microscopic plants and animals on which it feeds. In
other words, the tiny amoebae exhibits what appears to be intelligence,
even though it has no brain! No materialistic theory of evolution can
account for this. The fact is,God made it so!

A Myxomycete (slime mould) with intelligence?

Scientists have discovered that a single-celled organism can negotiate the
shortest way through a maze. It means that some of the lowliest creatures in the plant and animal kingdoms, such as slime and amoeba, may not be as primitive as once thought.
Pieces of slime mould, an amoeba-like organism, were enticed through a 30-square-centimetre (five-square-inch) maze by the prospect of food at the end of the puzzle. The researchers believe the slime is exhibiting some form of primitive intelligence. Toshiyuki Nakagaki of the Bio-Mimetic Control Research Centre, Nagoya, Japan, placed pieces of the slime mould Physarum polycephalum in an agar gel maze comprising four possible routes. Normally, the slime spreads out its network of tube-like 'legs', called pseudopodia, to fill all the available space. But when two pieces of food were placed at separate exit points in the labyrinth, the organism squeezed its entire body between the two nutrients. It adopted the shortest possible route, effectively solving the puzzle.

Announcing their findings in the journal Nature, the researchers say they believe the organism changed its shape to maximise its foraging efficiency and therefore its chances of survival. The meal of ground oat flakes led to a local increase in contraction of the organism's tube-like structures, propelling it towards the food. "This remarkable process of cellular computation implies that cellular materials can show a primitive intelligence," the team writes in Nature.

Slime mould is one of a group of single- to multi-celled organisms traditionally classified as fungi but having characteristics of both plants and animals. They reproduce by spores, but their cells can move like an amoeba and they feed by taking in particles of food. Some types of slime mould are the bane of gardeners, forming a jelly-like surface on grass.

"pound for pound, the amoeba is the most vicious organism on earth..."

amoeba also ameba (e-mê´be) noun plural amoebas or amoebae (-bê)
A protozoan of the genus Amoeba or related genera, occurring in water and soil and as a parasite in other animals. An amoeba has no definite form and consists essentially of a mass of protoplasm containing one nucleus or more surrounded by a delicate, flexible outer membrane. It moves by means of pseudopods. [New Latin, genus name, from Greek amoibê, change, from ameibein, to change.] - amoe´bic (-bîk) adjective

ameba (e-mê´be) or amoeba, one-celled PROTOZOAN in the phylum Sarcodina. Amebas constantly change their body shape as they form temporary extensions called pseudopods, or false feet, used for feeding and locomotion. Most amebas range from 5 to 20 microns in diameter. They engulf their prey (diatoms, algae, or bacteria) with their pseudopods, forming vacuoles in which food is digested by ENZYMES. Reproduction is usually by binary fission (splitting) to produce two daughter amebas, the nucleus dividing by MITOSIS; some also reproduce sexually. Amebas live in fresh and marine waters and the upper layers of soil. Many are PARASITES of aquatic and terrestrial animals, and some cause disease, e.g., amebic dysentery.

Social Amoeba: Dictyostelium discoideum and other DictyostelidsThe study of group-living organisms, like the social insects, has provided a wealth of insights into social evolution. Nonetheless, empirical work on these complex systems is limiting, or at the very least challenging, with regard to insights into the molecular or genetic mechanisms underlying cooperation and exploitation. Thus, more progress might be made by studying altruism at another level. Recent work has demonstrated the unrealized potential of a microbial system in the study of social evolution. The cellular slime molds of the Dictyostelidae possess an unusual developmental cycle. When starved, individual amoebae aggregate to form a multicellular fruiting body in which some cells give up reproduction and become sterile stalk cells that aid in the dispersal of the fertile spore cells. Recent work has shown in nature that genetically distinct clones of the social amoeba, Dictyostelium discoideum, can mix to form chimeras, and sometimes, one clone can exploit the other by contributing less than its proportional share to the sterile stalk (Strassmann, Zhu, & Queller 2000, Nature 408: 965-967). I propose to explore whether exploitation occurs in other dictyostelid species and whether natural variation across species in the expression patterns of genes known to affect spore/stalk allocation is important in cheating. Identifying the gene or genes involved in exploitation will be a major advance. Elucidation of the costs and benefits of chimerism across the social amoebae will increase our understanding of the origins of multicellularity, the costs of chimerism, the genetic mechanisms of exploitation, and the evolutionary history of this important social trait. Thus, these micro-organisms, have great promise in providing a powerful laboratory system for a deeper understanding of social evolution.

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Swirling down the drain of despair,I hit the bottom hard.Lying on the ilk-ridden surface,I dare not move.Amoebic organisms of acid trail all around me,searching, hunting for my exposed flesh.My heart lies just out of reach-beating in honesty ever louder than before.With my mind I beg it to cease it's rhythmic flood of emotion.Deaf to all cognitive reasoning, my heart continues to pour out all it has to bear.As I feared, a gelatin destroyer moves away,and toward my bleeding heart.Defenseless; the creature falls upon it, slowly melting it into itself.

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We are amoebic gods.