Single Cell Eyeball Creature

[yogi]

Greg Gavelis at the University of British Columbia and his colleagues discovered a single cell creature with a fully developed eye. It's not just a light sensitive spot; the eye possesses many of the features of the human eye, including a lens, cornea and retina. The one cell creature is called a warnowiids and it is not clearly understood how it uses it's eye. An eye is a very complex structure that has baffled many a scientist regarding it's evolutionary development. They now have this missing link in a single cell creature that lives in the waters off Canada and Japan.

https://cosmosmagazine.com/life-science ... scientists

[Kellemora]

Single Cell eh? The article is describing millions of cells and calling them a single cell, hmm.
I guess it is possible, a jail cell is a single cell, but contains hundreds of components, hi hi...
;-)

[Icey]

It's brilliant isn't it? Tom Cronin, a scientist from Maryland, suggests that the "eye" isn't actually an eye as we know it, but a glorified chloroplast (which contains chlorophyll and in which photosynthesis takes place).

He says: "Maybe its function is to provide its owner with energy, and the “lens” is just a way of focusing more light? Maybe the eye-like elements help the creature to orient itself in the brightest direction?" In other words - a food store.

More research needs to be done on these minute organisms. The lens of the "eye" could be formed from mitochondria, as happens in some flatworms.

Mitochondria and plastids have their own DNA, their own membranes, and their reproduction is not tied to the reproductive cycle of the host cell. However, they're considered to be organelles rather than a separate species in symbiosis (which means 2 dissimilar organisms which live together) with eukaryotes (any organism whose cells contain a nucleus and other organelles enclosed within membranes), but means that the warnowiids ARE independent organisms in single- cell plankton. It'd be very interesting to find out more about these "creatures".

[Kellemora]

Over my head Icey, way over my head in fact, hi hi...

[Icey]

Nah, Gary, don't worry about it. We couldn't do without eukaryotes - we wouldn't be here! : )

Suffice it to say that no one's quite sure what the purpose of this "eye" is yet, but it seems as though the American scientists're going to have a good go at trying to find out! Biology at molecular level interests me. Present me with a computer problem and ... well ... ditto. Straight over my head! : )

[Kellemora]

It just seems to me that the eye itself, no matter how simple, would consist of hundreds if not thousand of cells or more.
Which would mean they are no longer talking about a single cell creature.
Or it could be a separate multi-celled parasite living on the single cell creature.
A single cell is a single cell.

[Icey]

You're right, but in actual fact, those "eyes" are at sub-cellular level. They contain the nucleus of the single cell they "live" in, which makes it ... a single cell organism as a whole. I want to see what else they find out about these little things. It's complex, but fascinating. I can see what you mean though.

[Kellemora]

OK, you got me on that one Icey. I forgot a Cell is like an Atom and contains multiple components inside.
I guess I wasn't too far off. A Jail Cell has several components, and can house several inmates, hi hi...

[Icey]

Love it!!