Ref ID : 2020
Jurg Rieder; Critical Revision of the Literature and New communications on the Genus Metacineta Butschli (Protozoa, Suctoria) with Proposal of a Consequential Taxonomy. Arch.Protistenk. 130:201-287, 1985
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The present review aims at the following ends: 1. to trace critically the development of knowledge on the suctorian genus Metacineta, from the first discovery of a representative up to end of 1981. This was done by quoting the essential parts of the "road-making" earlier publications, either in the original wording or in reporting manner, and completing the results by detailed new descriptions of seven forms examined by the author. 2. to condense and discuss in one paper the entire information existing today on the subject mentioned. Hereby the general properties characteristic for the whole genus, concerning morphology of the adults and the larvae, reproduction and encystment are brought to evidence. 3. to clear, as far as possible, the unsatisfactory and confusing systematical situation of the genus Metacineta that already lasts for many decades. Therefore the relevant contributions of the former authors were combined with own findings and observations of the writer, most of which are communicated here for the first time. From the totality of this material it becomes obvious that the astonishing multiplicity of forms seen within the genus Metacineta is not just the expression of an extensive and multifarious variability between individuals belonging all to the same systematical taxon, but that there exist a series of such entities, each biologically stable within statistical limits. The writer got also the opinion that several among these groups are sufficiently different from all others that the introduction of separate species for them appears adequate, whereas the remaining ones have only the taxonomical value of varieties. Therefore he has stipulated some principles (listed on p.279) that can serve to distinguish between these two categories. After elimination of four formerly established taxa that were considered as obsolete, these guidelines were used to bring the others in a suitable order. Although this systematisation cannot be founded on the real phylogenetical relationship of the various forms, it is at least useful for practical purposes, such as identification and determination, and has allowed to construct the determination-key presented on p.281.