Dictyostelium Discoideum

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Dictyostelium discoideum is an amoeba in the class Dictyostelia which is a group of cellular slime molds, also known as social amoebae. Their life cycle begins when they hatch from spores into myxamoebae. In this stage they are unicellular amoebae that reproduce by mitosis. Mainly found in soil these amoebae have a very short life cycle, only 24 hours long. Dictyostelium discoideum have 3 methods of reproduction; mitosis, sexual reproduction, and asexual reproduction. The first method is carried out while the cell is in its unicellular form. The second mode occurs when cells of opposite mating types fuse together creating a macrocyst that forms a zygote that engulfs surrounding bacteria and as it germinates, haploid myxamoebae are released. …show more content…

The amoebae feed on bacteria that secrete folic acid which attracts them. When the supply of bacteria runs out, the amoebae aggregate to form a multicellular fruiting body composed of a stalk and a spore containing sorus. This aggregation begins with the secretion of Cyclic AMP (cAMP) by a few cells which attracts other amoebae to them. They clump together and form what is called a Dictyostelium discoideum slug with anywhere from 100 to 2,000,000 amoebae in it that has motility due to a cellulose sheath secreted by the cells. It migrates towards light and heat, meaning the surface of the soil and once it is there the cells begin to differentiate into pre-stalk and pre-spore cells. The stalks grow upwards as high as they can to spread spores as far as possible to a more favorable environment, one with more bacteria. The farther the spores travel, the more likely they are to find a bacteria rich location. Genetically Dictyostelium discoideum has 6 chromosomes and is closely related to higher metazoans (a subkingdom of multicellular animals with differentiated cell types as well as usually a digestive tract and nervous system) which makes it a good candidate for genetic

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