Paramecium, Euglena And Amoeba (1962)

I've been looking through this microscope it's very like the ones you are using and an admirable little instrument it is magnifies up to two or 300 but I find there are some difficulties with it as you work with it it's not too steady and it tends to jiggle around somewhat it's very difficult to get the light just perfect so you see the most out of the material that you are studying and the material is so interesting I've been looking at this parium and ukina and amoeba I think it'd be nice to look at them through a better microscope now this is much better not just because it's bigger but because it's made with the utmost skill and precision very steady as you move the focusing or do any other adjustments it doesn't GLE you can move them with the greatest delicacy and accuracy the lenses are about as perfect as you can get and you can change the light you can change it so it looks deep into the interior of things or so the background is dark and the thing itself is brilliantly lighted doing all these things then you can watch with your eyes or you can place here a motion picture camera and so we can record on film all the interesting things that you want to see so we have done that let us look at that film do you recognize these of course you do you're watching parum or one of its close relatives and what can you tell about it by watching are they all the same shape are they all the same size are they all built in the same way here is one swimming around by itself it's not ex same kind as the ones you just saw but it's definitely a parames now as you watch it what do you see it doing is it swimming in a flat plane the way you would swim on the surface of the water or does does it go down deeper and then does it come up toward you can you see if it makes a spiral as it swims if it twists as it goes through the water now look at its shape can you see if the outside is stiff and rigid or whether it's flexible let's take a closer look at this now with some red particles in the water watch here as it squeezes past one clump of these do you see how the cell wall is dented in and what else can you see in this magnified view here's the nucleus that's easy to find here's something else very interesting because of this movement in the water right here this curved indented part of the paramecium seems to be sweeping particles into the inside of the cell here you can see how the red particles in the water have been swept into the cell and gathered together in clumps in what we call food vacu what is this thing that appears and disappears that expands and contracts it's called the contractile vacu and param meum there are two of them what do you think they do for the cell let's watch how this parium moves through the water and think how it does this can you see any equipment any fins any paddles by which it swims what makes it go as you look more closely at this what do you see do you notice that flickering along the outside of the cell wall do you see the particles in the water as they move by do you think there's something here pushing against the water if there is why can't we see it here with more part IAL in the water the currents in the water are even more clear to you is there something here perhaps moving so quickly that we can't quite see it here if you watch very carefully around the outside of the parium you can see the equipment by which it moves there are these tiny hairlike things that beat against the water in rhythmic waves which move the parames through the water also the action of these sweeps food into the Gully these are called silia you have to look rather carefully to see them so now you know what it is that moves the parium through the water and here are some other microscopic creatures moving around do you recognize youen among them how would you describe the shape like a cigar like a and what kind of wall does this cell have is it like the param ium fairly firm but elastic and capable of being dented let's watch what characteristic do you think this cell wall would have that would allow these remarkable changes of shape and after this change would let it resume its long shape and swim away gain watch how the stuff inside the cell is pushed and pulled as the olenina changes shape it's difficult to see the nucleus here because the whole interior is densely packed with material there's a granulous stuff and there are those dark heavy green bodies green bodies are very interesting you saw them before in plant cells but does this look like a plant cell does it act like a plant cell is there a front end does it ever back up like the parames or does it turn completely around when it changes Direction look at the front end you can see a thing like a whiplash that is lashing about in the water this Whiplash like thing this equipment by which the ugina moves through the water very interesting thing as you saw from the front end of the cell there extends this long lash and it's really about as long as the length of the cell itself and as it twists and spirals in the water it pulls the body the pickle shaped body of the ugina after it through the relativ thick stuff of the water here is the amoeba does it have any definite fixed shape do you see any movement at all doesn't seem to swim about does it but watch here do you see any changing going on what do you think could be causing this let's look more closely looking at the granulous stuff inside the cell you see that there's a flowing going on the whole inside of the cell is Flowing down into that extension and as this material flows the extension moves forward changing the shape of the amoeba you can see here that the material from the whole cell is Flowing down is moving and this is how the amoeba moves by extending a part of itself and then transferring all of the inside of the cell into that extension it seems to pour itself from one place to another and yet those who have worked on this although they have some 12 theories do not yet know precisely how this movement occurs with this dark background you see an amoeba and parames and ugina also and you can compare their size watch how it flows down as if to catch the parames in these indentations do you think it ever catches one what's inside here it's a parames but the pale color is because it has been partly digested so you see that this flowing of the amoeba can also be used to surround and capture food which is later digested inside before we leave the microscope let's look at that fascinating flowing of the cell again that movement so characteristic of amiba there with that better microscope and all the perfect adjustment for lighting and things of that sort you could see more couldn't you you could see more clearly you could understand better and you could answer some of the questions that had come up in your mind but you also realize that you'd been seeing these things before with your own microscope and now that you've seen them here so much better you're going to go back and using your own microscope you'll be able to see much more so you're going to study again parium and ugina and amoeba and in your study of these and the watching you now will do I wish you the best of luck