Catalogue of Organisms: Like, Wow. Just... Wow.
One hundred and sixty-seven species of ciliate, artfully arranged and all drawn to scale, from the gigantic Stentor to the sinuous Homalozoon to the infinitesimal Cinetochilum. The image comes from here, where not only can you see it in its full glory, but you'll find the key to the numbering that tells you what each one of these marvels is. The species are partially arranged in line with their chosen habitats - those towards the top left are found in the open water column in lakes, those around the centre of the bottom are anaerobes, while the others make their homes among sediment. And there's even little extra bits of detail hidden within - see if you can find the Chilodonella crawling along the Epistylis stalk, for instance. Enjoy!
Spam? What spam? I see no spam (thanks to the wonders of the "delete comment" function). And I'm more amazed that you even have a "resident ciliatologist".
I didn't know about Stentor, but one of my earlier posts does include the mind-blowing factoid that a feeding Euplotes is able to generate the equivalent of twice its cell surface in vacuole membrane over the course of five minutes! That's like a human swallowing a Mini Cooper.
Our ciliatologist worked on Paramecium cell cycle stuff -- really fascinating! Reviewed here, if interested.
He also told me some hypotrichs, like Euplotes, after being messed with (eg. surgically fused into doublets) can encyst (and lose all cortical markings) normally and then RETAIN the cortical deviations upon excystment, somehow. No one really knows how it works, but evidence is pointing to some really unique and special cortical organisation mechanism.