Tintinnidorin, the name we have chosen for the shell proteins, has roots in different languages (Greek: dôron, neuter, noun). Its core meaning revolves around the concept of a gift handed down through generations.

Thank you!

Yeast become tintinnids!

Thank you Kenneth. I am super proud of this discovery. What tintinnids can do is just amazing!

Finally, we’ve solved a long-standing mystery: what tintinnid shells are actually made of:
A new class of biomaterial formed by remarkable structural proteins unique to tintinnids.
A major milestone after 3 years of work! Read about it in our preprint: doi.org/10.64898/202...
#ProtistsOnSky

Currently, we have no culture unfortunately. There might be an opportunity in spring next year, so we should keep it in mind!

Next try: @dudinlab.bsky.social 😅

Top row images showing cells of the tintinnid ciliate Schmidingerella from early to late division stages. Shell-forming material ist stained in purple/red. Bottom row images show 3D models of the material for volumetric analyses.

We recently investigated how much and when tintinnid ciliates produce shell material during the cell cycle to construct a new shell (lorica) after division: tinyurl.com/49usp8xw
We adapted a classical staining technique.

Still no #UExM for tintinnids dudinlab.bsky.social‬? (wink)

#protistsonsky

Plankton sampled in Villefranche-sur-Mer. Animal larval stages, copepods, ciliates, tintinnids, foraminifera, and radiolarians.

Tinntinid ciliates are known because of their remarkable and taxonomically relevant shells. Can you spot the #tintinnids we sampled in Villefranche-sur-Mer (visiting @tintinnman.bsky.social) among the other planktonic organisms?
Do you want to know how tintinnids build their shells?
#protistsonsky