Portrait

Descrição:

Portrait of Microthorax tridentatus (Penard,1922), a small nassophorean ciliate. The body is strongly dorsoventrally flattened. The right side is gently rounded and the left is straight. The body has delicately ridged armor, which bears three short posterior spines in this species. The cytostome is in a notch in the left posterior body. The spheroid macronucleus is central. One or two contractile vacuoles are usually adjacent to the oral aperture. Collected from a slow moving organically enriched freshwater stream near Boise, Idaho. DIC optics.