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Name derivation:

'Small golden cell" -- “Chryso-” golden and “-pyxis”container (Ref. Gérard Giraud 2021)

 

Classification:

Chrysopyxis  F. Stein  1878;  7 of 12 species descriptions are currently accepted taxonomically (Guiry and Guiry  2014).

Order Hibberdiales;  Family Stylococcaceae

 

Morphology:

Chrysopyxis is characterized by its solitary vegetative cells, which are surrounded by a vase-shaped lorica with two basal prong-like projections. The loricate cells occur as epiphytes on filamentous chlorophycean algae through attachment by basal projections. The single ununucleate protoplasts is free inside the lorica, and , depending on the species, has one or two contractile vacuoles, or or two chromatophores, and either a flagellum or rhizopodium (King, 1984)

The epiphyte appears as a bareback horseman

Pulsating vacuoles:

The monadal vegetative type and the monadal zoospores formed by species in the other orders possess pulsating vacuoles that are present in the freshwater species and some of the marine species. They are usually paired and pulsate alternately. Chrysopyxis have these vacuoles at the basal positions away from the flagellum. (Klien and Cronquist, 1968)

Similar genera:

 

Habitat:

Found throughout freshwater habitats but best observed in the stagnant waters of Florida (Stokes 1888).

The Pyrenean peat-bogs have a moderately to highly diverse chrysophyte flora, which is very close to that described from the Alps by Ettl (1968, 1970), the Tatry mountains by Hindák & Kováčik (1993) and Nordic cold countries. The actual taxa are considered morphological species, because the possibility exists that some of them could be merely zoospores or different phenologic stages of the same taxa (Jaume Cambra).

 

 

References:

Cambra, J.  2010.  Chrysophytes from some lakes and peat-bogs in the eastern Pyrenees, Catalonia (Spain).  Biologia Volume 65, Issue 4, pp 577-586.

Guiry, M.D. and G.M. Guiry  2013.  AlgaeBase. World-wide electronic publication, National University of Ireland, Galway. http://www.algaebase.org; searched on 07 May 2013.

King, J.M.  1984.. The Occurrence of Chrysopyxis urna (Chrysophyceae) in the United States. Transactions of the American Microscopical Society 103(3)317-319. Wiley. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3226193.

Klein, R.M., and A. Cronquist  1967 . A consideration of the evolutionary and taxonomic significance of some biochemical, micromorphological, and physiological characters in the Thallophytes. The Quarterly Review of Biology 42( 2):108-296. University of Chicago Press.  http://www.jstor.org/stable/2820379.

Stein, F. von (1878). Der Organismus der Flagellaten. In: Der Organismus der Infusionsthiere. ( Eds) Vol. 1, pp. 1-154. Leipzig, Germany: Verlag von Wilhelm Engelmann.

Stokes, A.C. 1888.  A preliminary contribution toward a history of the freshwater Infusoria of the United States.  Journal Trenton Natural History Society,  Nat. History Society 1:71.