unicellular -soil, freshwater, ocean and parasitic

asymmetric body form and continually change shape

move and engulf food by pseudopodia

Amoeboids Reproduce asexually by binary fission
Entamoeba hystolitica - human dysentery
Acanthamoeba sp. infections in contact lens users

Marine organisms that secretes chalky

many chambered tests with pores,
cytoplasmic projections can be extended to catch prey.
endosymbiotic with unicellular algae
Foraminiferan
live ocean floor, others as plankton. e.g. Globigerina
Dead forams settle on the bottom of the ocean.
markers to help identify sedimentary rock layers

marine plankton organisms

with long, filamentous cytoplasmic projections called axopods
A cluster of microtubules strengthens each axopod.
Prey become entangled in these axopods
Actinopods Most of actinopods e.g. Actinophrys have algal endosymbiont
Axopods increase the surface area - floating
Prey can be phagocytize by the thin layer of cytoplasm
Some known as radiolarians - glassy shells made of silica

Mostly unicellular (a feware colonial)

with spherical or elongated body
CHAPTER 4 - PROTOZOA a single central nucleus, and one/many long,
whiplike flagella.
Move by lashingflexible flagella
Some engulf food by forming pseudopodia like amoeba

Zooflagellates Heterotrophic.Free-living or endosymbionts.

e.g Trichonymphs live in the guts of termites.
(Zoomastigophora)
digest cellulose in the wood the termites eat
can cause disease e.g. Trypanosoma;
causes African sleeping sickness
Read symptoms of African Sleeping Sickness

Diplomonad e.g. Giardia intestinalis causes

backpackers’diarrhea

Unicellular organisms,possess flexible outer

Ciliates (Ciliophora)
coverage called pellicle
thousand fine, short, hairlike cilia
trichocysts, organelles that discharge
filaments to aid trapping and holding prey.
Some are sessile, and although motile they prefer
attach to substrate

Ciliates have two kinds of nuclei

asexual process called conjugation

Large group of parasitic

Lack of specific structures e.g. cilia, flagella or pseudopodia

Apicomplexans some produce sporozoits (small infective agents transmitted

to the next host)
Plasmodium which cause malaria

Prepared by: Haji Muzamil Haji Mustaffa, Ph.D

UiTM Cawangan Pahang