A new interpretation of stomatogenesis in a peritrich ciliate: Using Campanella umbellaria as a model system

Abstract

The process of stomatogenesis in peritrich ciliates is still incompletely understood. Previous studies on the stomatogenesis of four species of peritrichs, Telotrochidium sp., Carchesium polypinum, Opercularia coarctata, and Astylozoon pyriforme conflict with one another in some cases and omit details of events in others. We described the entire process of stomatogenesis in the peritrich ciliate Campanella umbellaria (C. umbellaria) using an improved method of staining with protargol. Our results disagree with some previous studies with regard to the formation of some rudimentary structures, reorganization of the parental haplokinety, formation of new germinal rows, and separation of daughter oral complexes. The pattern of stomatogenesis characteristic of peritrichs is compared to the stomatogenetic patterns of three other oligohymenophorean subclasses and a hypothesis about the evolution of stomatogenesis in the class Oligohymenophorea is offered. Details of stomatogenesis need to be described and verified in a greater variety of peritrichs to clarify possible differences between taxa and make it possible to relate stomatogenesis to evolution within the subclass Peritrichia. Ultrastructural studies are the next step in description of morphogenetic processes in peritrichs, and characteristics of C. umbellaria make it a useful model for this work.

Evolution of Variations in the Common Pattern of Stomatogenesis in Peritrich Ciliates: Evidence from a Comparative Study Including a New Description of Stomatogenesis in Pseudepistylis songi Peng et al.,

“…The articles by Wang et al. () and Wu et al. (), focusing on the large, colonial species Campanella umbellaria (Linnaeus, 1758) and Epistylis chlorelligerum Shen, 1980, were done with an improved method of silver staining with protargol and described differences in the details of stomatogenesis in these two species, supporting the hypothesis that most differences reported by previous investigators are probably genuine rather than the result of observational error.…”

“…Studies on the stomatogenesis of peritrichs have confirmed that this appears to be true in a general sense, but at the same time, they have uncovered morphogenetic differences among the taxa investigated (Wang et al. ). In particular, there are differing descriptions of how the germinal anlage, the infundibular polykineties of the new oral complex, the new haplokineties, and the new germinal kineties of daughter cells are formed (Eperon ; Esteban and Fernández‐Galiano ; Fernández‐Galiano et al.…”

“…Two recent articles (Wang et al. ; Wu et al. ) described stomatogenesis in large, colonial species of peritrichs, but a total of eight articles is still an astonishingly small number in view of the large size of the subclass Peritrichia (more than 800 species described according to Foissner et al.…”

“… is a colonial species of peritrich with a large cell body (160–285 × 120–190 μm) and, thus, can be regarded as an especially suitable species for investigation of stomatogenesis in peritrich ciliates (Wang et al. ). In the present article, we investigated the morphogenesis of P .…”

“…songi , including all events in stomatogenesis, with the same improved protargol method used by Wang et al. (). Our new results allowed us to make a meaningful comparison of the variations of stomatogenesis observed in peritrichs and begin to relate them to evolution within the group in light of recently published molecular phylogenies (Clamp and Williams ; Li et al.…”