Xenophyophores: The Strange Life of a Giant Single Cell
You may think of single-celled organisms as being microscopically small, but these ocean dwellers are a little heftier than that. Hosted by: Hank Green ---------- Support SciShow by becoming...
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It’s safe to say that we have explored most of the land on our planet at this point. But the oceans are a totally different story. We’ve probably covered less than 5% of what’s down there. So it’s not too surprising that scientists and explorers keep finding things in the ocean that don’t seem to follow the usual rules of biology. For example, a single-celled organism called a xenophyophore. See, even though xenophyophores are single-celled, they’re usually about 10 centimeters in diameter. And the largest ones can grow to about 20 centimeters. They’re a type of protist, meaning that their cells have a nucleus, but they’re not a plant, animal, or fungus. Xenophyophores are really hard to study, because they are fragile and no one’s been ...
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It’s safe to say that we have explored most of the land on our planet at this point. But the oceans are a totally different story. We’ve probably covered less than 5% of what’s down there. So it’s not too surprising that scientists and explorers keep finding things in the ocean that don’t seem to follow the usual rules of biology. For example, a single-celled organism called a xenophyophore. See, even though xenophyophores are single-celled, they’re usually about 10 centimeters in diameter. And the largest ones can grow to about 20 centimeters. They’re a type of protist, meaning that their cells have a nucleus, but they’re not a plant, animal, or fungus. Xenophyophores are really hard to study, because they are fragile and no one’s been ...
