It is commonly believed that bacteria are microscopic – stealthy and hidden from the naked eye. But the bacterium, Epulopiscium fishelsoni, is a microbial behemoth you can see with the human eye alone. First discovered in the intestines of a brown surgeonfish in the Red Sea in 1985, this giant bacterium was first classified as a protist because of its large size. In 1993, rRNA sequencing revealed that this organism is actually a bacterium.
Epulopiscium varies between 10- to 20-fold in length and has a volume more than 2,000 times that of a typical bacterium. They range from 200 – 700 microns in length, about the size of a grain of table salt. But being big does have its downsides.
Challenges That Come With an Increased Cell Size
As cell size increases, both the surface area and volume increases. The trouble comes because volume increases much faster than surface area. This increased volume poses challenges to giant bacteria that the typical bacterium does not face.
With a small size, bacteria can use simple diffusion to transport molecules and nutrients inside their cell membranes and within the cell. When the cell size increases, diffusion becomes much too slow to be functional. To overcome the diffusion problem, the Epulopiscium cell membrane is wrinkly instead of a flat, smooth surface. The wrinkles lend to more surface area of the membrane where diffusion and transport of molecules into the cell can take place.
Large cells, such as those within eukaryotic organisms, evolved internal structures to more efficiently transport molecules within the cell. Epulopiscium cells, however, do not contain these structures. But they have evolved other ways to deal with the transport problem.
Thousands of Genome Copies Help With Local Gene Expression
In 2008, researchers found an extremely large amount of DNA within the cell. Epulopisicium cells can contain anywhere between 85 pg and 250 pg of DNA, or about 14 to 42 times as much DNA as a human cell. An E. coli cell contains 0.017 pg of DNA meaning Epulopsicium contains 5,000 to 15,000 times as much DNA as the typical bacterium. This immense amount of DNA is not just one chromosome – each cell contains thousands of copies of its genome. This means that copies of the same gene are scattered about the cell resulting in gene expression that can happen locally, without the need of large-scale diffusion.
Epulopiscium is yet another example of the diverse lifestyles of microbes and reminds us that we find microbes in the most obscure places and in the most astounding forms. Epulopsicium defies the conventional view of microbe and leaves us wondering: how big is too big for a bacterium?
So was the bacteria being cell fish?
No, it seems they in fact have a symbiotic relationship.
lol
HAHAHAHA LMAO UR SO FUNNY xD
some people have a form of extrasensory perception which gives them the ability* to see all forms of bacteria, viruses, and other microbial life (parasitic and mutualistic); unfortunately differentiating the ‘good guys’ from ‘bad guys’ is rare. *see Mysophobia
Microorganism to be seen naked eye. Because these are very small in size. These organisms can be seen with of microscope and lens.
I saw a living bacteria move across my unlit phone screen last night. I watched it for a minute. It was kind of interesting and kind of scared me at the same time. But it was not long or as narrow as the one they are showing.
All phobias are irrational by definition. If science ever proves that there are people who can truly “sense” something that was previously unperceivable, they wouldn’t call it *something*-phobia. Or the name would be changed if it was initially classified as a phobia.
Believing that people with mysophobia can sense microorganisms is akin to believing that schizophrenics aren’t hallucinating but are actually perceiving “ghosts/spirits/alternate realities”. Either one (or both) may very well end up being true in the future and you’re free to believe anything, but don’t word those beliefs like they’re facts.