MicroSafari – Up Close With Paramecium

This installment in my MicroSafari series focuses on the famous single celled ciliate Paramecium. Most students never get to see a good up close view of what actually is happening inside a paramecium because they tend to move very quickly and appear as “herky jerky” blurs to most folks unless you place them in a solution of “ProtoSlo” (methyl cellulose – I call it jello for microorganisms). This keeps them from swimming so fast and lets us see them in one spot where a higher power lens can focus on their internal activities such a food vacuole formation (eating) and contractile vacuole filling and contraction (drinking & peeing). When you get close enough to these creatures to see these things, you also get to appreciate their cilia and how quickly they beat. So – take a couple minutes and get up close with this most famous citizen of the microworld! 

Congratulation to my friends at EXO LABS ( www.exolabs.com) who created the FOCUS Microscope Camera I use  for these videos - the FOCUS camera was recently featured in Apple's 30th anniversary video for the Mac - at 38 seconds into the video you can see students using the FOCUS camera with an  iPad to view what's under their microscope! 

Way to go Exo!