Larger foraminifera, giant cells with a historical background

Abstract

The history of foraminifera as recorded by the shell of numerous taxa illustrates the repetitive rise of benthic, large-sized K-strategists throughout geologic time. The phylogeny reconstructed by methods of comparative anatomy and supported by biostratigraphic distribution permits to identify analogous shell structures pointing to functions of the living cell. The shell registers autecological adaptation, ontogeny, protoplasmic streaming patterns, protoplasmic differentiation and patterns of differentiation at the cell surface. The high potential of shell regeneration points to the functional importance of shell shape during the long vegetative life and documents experiments performed by nature itself. The extended knowledge of their history, their size and their natural recording device in their shell predestines the foraminifera as experimental system to explore the performances of free-living single cells and many mechanisms regulating their life.