In this article we will discuss about the structure of paramecium. This will also help you to draw the structure and diagram of paramecium.
1. Fresh water, free living, omnipresent and is found in stagnant water.
2. Body like a slipper with anterior end narrow and rounded and posterior e-c broad and pointed. Uniform ciliation all over body except at post, end where ciliation are large & form a caudal tuft.
3. Body is surrounded by a tough & elastic pellicle.
4. Cytoplasm well differentiated into ecto and endoplasm.
5. Ectoplasm is having uniform row of trichocysts and longitudinal rows of myonemes.
6. On one side lies an oral groove which extends into gullet near the middle.
7. At the base of gullet lies an aperture the cytostome, which opens into a tubular cytopharyrtx.
8. Behind the cytopharynx, on the side, lies the cytopyge or anus.
9. Endoplasm possesses a large kidney shaped meganucleus and a small micronucleus.
10. Contractile vacuoles two or even more.
11. Nutrition heterotrophic and reproduction by asexual as well as sexual methods.
12. Sexual reproduction through endomixis, conjugation or hemimixis and asexual reproduction through binary fission.