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Amoeboid Cells

Amoeboid cells move or feed using pseudopods, which are temporary projections from their cell walls. They seem to have developed independently in several types of microscopic organisms; protozoans include some amoeboids, but so do human white blood cells, which wrap pseudopods around invading organisms to engulf and devour them. The most commonly known amoeboid is Amoeba proteus.

Amoeboids can be classed in several different categories depending on pseudopod structure: actonopods, rhizopods (divided into lobes, filose, and reticulose amoebae), and the uncategorizable giant marine amoeboids xenophyophores.

Amoeboids move by allowing their body masses to flow into the pseudopods they form. Most are classed into the Amoebozoa and Percolozoa groups; the first is primarily slime mould, and the other a group that swap forms from amoeboid to flagellate forms. Filose amoebae sometimes produce shells; all are included in the Cercozoa group, with some appearing closer to animals and others closer to fungus in form and behavior. Reticulose pseudopods form cytoplasmic strands that merge into a sort of net; the foraminifera are the most well known of this group.

Web Resources On Amoeboid Cells

The Amoebae
Amoeboid Movement

Book Resources On Amoeboid Cells

Amoeboid Movement by Robert Day Allen
Gigantomonas herculea Dogiel by Harold Kirby

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