Quadracorpus istus

Quadracorpus istus
Creator	Aldank Memestein
Information
Status	Extant
Zones	27
Roles	Producer
Classification
Genus	Quadracorpus
Species	Quadracorpus istus
Evolution
Date	April 14th, 2019
Ancestor	Unknown
Descendants	No results

This photosynthetic colonial Palaean lives in zone 27 with cells reaching 50 μm. It has a cell wall, nucleus, and photosynthetic organelles with orange pigments for absorbing light. It floats on the surface of the water which allows for the greatest amount of light absorption. The cells are covered in microvilli that it uses to catch Nebulimpa protos cells and kills them with perforin and granzymes to take their antifreeze compounds but does not gain nutrients from killing them.

The cells can act in two ways: productive and unproductive. Each colony has one cell at the center that is productive and will produce new cells forming branches of cells in 6 directions. When the productive cell divides half of it will be at the base of one of the branches as an unproductive cell and the other half will remain in the center and continue to be productive. The rest of the cells are unproductive and will not form new cells while in a colony.

If the colony is separated any isolated cells will begin acting as productive cells and form a new colony. The cell most central in the branch or most prepared to divide will become the productive cell for the new colony. New cells are formed approximately once a day. Cells that are in a colony will share nutrients to ensure the colony remains healthy. They share nutrients through plasmodesma that form between adjacent cells.