Table of Contents
Do all protists reproduce asexually?
Some protists reproduce sexually using gametes, while others reproduce asexually by binary fission. Some species, for example Plasmodium falciparum, have extremely complex life cycles that involve multiple forms of the organism, some of which reproduce sexually and others asexually.
Why do protists need oxygen?
Protists are mostly unicellular organisms but a few like kelp are the multicellular protists. They require oxygen for the process of respiration.
How do protists get energy?
Protists can be classified by their way of getting energy. Some protists capture sunlight and convert it to usable energy. Another group of protists gets its energy from eating other organisms. A third group gets energy by absorbing materials and nutrients from its environment.
Where are anaerobic protists found?
In many of the so-called ‘anaerobic protists’, the most anaerobic that we know are the methanogen-containing ciliates that inhabit the often highly sulphide-rich marine sediments.
Are protists aerobic or anaerobic?
Although most protists require oxygen (obligate aerobes), there are some that may or must rely on anaerobic metabolism—for example, parasitic forms inhabiting sites without free oxygen and some bottom-dwelling (benthic) ciliates that live in the sulfide zone of certain marine and freshwater sediments.
Do protists produce oxygen?
Protists produce almost one-half of the oxygen on the planet through . Plant-like protists produce almost one-half of the oxygen on the planet through photosynthesis. Other protists decompose and recycle nutrients that humans need to live.
Is protist aerobic or anaerobic?
What protists are anaerobic?
Many types of anaerobic protists such as amoeba, ciliates, and flagellates have been observed in anaerobic environments under a microscope [13,14,15,16] and predation by protists strongly affect bacterial and archaeal community structures in anaerobic ecosystems [17, 18], but few studies that focused on the predation …
Respiration and nutrition. At the cellular level, the metabolic pathways known for protists are essentially no different from those found among cells and tissues of other eukaryotes.
Which is a characteristic of a photosynthetic protist?
Photosynthetic protists (photoautotrophs) are characterized by the presence of chloroplasts. Other protists are heterotrophs and consume organic materials (such as other organisms) to obtain nutrition.
What kind of food does a protist need?
Phagotrophic heterotrophy is seen in many ciliates that seem to require live prey as organic sources of energy, carbon, nitrogen, vitamins, and growth factors. The food of free-living phagotrophic protists ranges from other protists to bacteria to plant and animal material, living or dead.
What is the function of saprobic protists in plants?
Saprobic protists have the essential function of returning inorganic nutrients to the soil and water. This process allows for new plant growth, which in turn generates sustenance for other organisms along the food chain.