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Plankton Zoom Gallery
By Dr. Biology and Amy Hansen
show/hide words to know
- Micrometer: a very small unit of length. There are one million micrometers in a meter.
- Microscopist: a scientist that mainly uses a microscope in their research.
- Organism: a living thing that can be small like bacteria or large like an elephant.
- Plankton: a group of free floating organisms living in water that includes many kinds of plants and animals... more
Plankton Up-close
Plankton comes in many shapes and sizes. These are just a few of the thousands of examples. Click on any of the plankton samples in the gallery below and use the zoom tool to explore the different shapes and textures of these amazing organisms.
Want to learn more about plankton? We also have a companion story called Invisible Watery World that you might like to check out.
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| Amoeba Zooplankton | Copepod nauplius (larva) Zooplankton | Ciliate Zooplankton |
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| Nematode Zooplankton | Coelastrum (green algae) Phytoplankton | Fragilariopsis cylindrus (diatom) Phytoplankton |
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| Chlamydomonas (green algae) Phytoplankton | Filamentous cyanobacteria and pennate diatoms Phytoplankton | Centric diatom Phytoplankton |
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| Filamentous green algae Phytoplankton | Tetraselmis and rotifer Phytoplankton and zooplankton | Pennate diatom Phytoplankton |
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| Tetraselmis Phytoplankton | Scenedesmus Phytoplankton | Pennate diatom Phytoplankton |
In case you are wondering why there are white lines on each image, they are used to show the size of each plankton. Microscopists call these lines scale bars, because they let a person know the size of an object. All the white lines above are equal to 50 micrometers.
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