All animals are multicellular, but some are too small to be seen by the naked eye. Microscopic arthropods include dust mites and spider mites. Microscopic crustaceans include copepods and the cladocera. Another common group of microscopic animals are the rotifers, which are filter feeders that are usually found in fresh water.
The green algae are a large group of photosynthetic eukaryotes that include many microscopic organisms. Although some green algae are classified as protists, others such as charophyta are classified with embryophyte plants, which are the most familiar group of land plants.
Bacteria are the most diverse and abundant group of organisms on Earth. Bacteria inhabit practically all environments where some liquid water is available and the temperature is below +140 °C. They are found in sea water, soil, animals' gastrointestinal tracts, hot springs and even deep beneath the Earth's crust in rocks.
Fungi are a kingdom of eukaryotic organisms. The fungi are heterotrophic organisms characterized by a chitinous cell wall, and in the majority of species, filamentous growth as multicellular hyphae forming a mycelium; some fungal species also grow as single cells. Sexual and asexual reproduction is commonly via spores, often produced on specialized structures or in fruiting bodies.
A virus is a sub-microscopic infectious agent that is unable to grow or reproduce outside a host cell. Virus diseases inflict a heavy illness and economic burden on humans and animals and can devastate agricultural crops. Each viral particle, or virion, consists of genetic material, DNA or RNA, within a protective protein coat called a capsid.
A prion is an infectious agent composed only of protein. They cause a number of diseases in a variety of animals, including Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) in cattle and Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) in humans. All known prion diseases affect the structure of the brain or other neural tissue, and all are currently untreatable and fatal. Mice genetically modified to avoid the symptoms are important models of study.
i think that animal cells, plants cells, and fungi are the good one beacuse they don't cause diseases that get you all icky and uncomfortable and the bad ones are bacteria, viruses, and prions beacuse they cause you to get sick and have a reson to stay at home. ;]
Thursday, December 6, 2007
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