Protist Project
Question:
Ms Spence,
I was wondering if you could help me with a biology project. I need to find the common and scientific name of a protist, but I searched the web for hours, and i could not find one. If you could help me, it would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you,
Steven
Answer:
Hi Steven, nice to hear from you. Protists are a very interesting group, and an important one for marine biology and reef ecology, because members of this group (more specifically, the group “dinoflagellates”) are responsible for ‘red tide’ which is also called harmful algal blooms, and others form symbioses with corals. Protists, including dinoflagellates, are tricky, though, because they are small, diverse, and not clearly classified. Many of them don’t have common names. You might check out this site http://zipcodezoo.com/Animals/C/Conus_marmoratus/
