Chapter III 

 KINGDOM MYCHOTA 



Kingdom I. MYCHOTA Enderlein 



Stamm Moneres Haeckel Gen. Morph. 2: xxii ( 1866), in part. 



ScHizoPHYTAE Cohn in Beitr. Biol. Pfl. 1, Heft 3: 201 (1875). 



Class ScHizoPHYTA or Protophyta McNab in Jour, of Bot. 15 : 340 ( 1877 ) ; not sec- 

 tion Protophyta nor cohors Protophyta Endlicher (1836). 



Kingdoms Protophyta and Protozoa Haeckel Syst. Phylog. 1: 90 (1894), in part; 

 not Protophyta Endlicher nor class Protozoa Goldfuss (1818). 



Subdivision Schizophyta Engler in Engler and Prantl Nat. Pflanzenfam. I Teil, 

 Abt. la: iii (1900). 



Division Schizophyta Wettstein Handb. Syst. Bot. 1 : 56 ( 1901 ). 



Phylum Protophyta Schaffner in Ohio Naturalist 9: 446 (1909), in part. 



Kingdom Mychota Enderlein Bakt.-Cyclog. 236 (1925). 



Kingdom Monera Copeland f. in Quart. Rev. Biol. 13: 385 (1938). 



Kingdom Anucleobionta Rothmaler in Biol. Zentralbl. 67: 248 (1948). 



Organisms without nuclei. 



The common name of Mychota in general is bacteria, but those which contain 

 chlorophyll together with other pigments which make the green color impure are 

 called blue-green algae. 



The cells of Mychota are always separate or physiologically independent: multi- 

 cellular bodies with distinct tissues do not occur. The cells are of various shapes; most 

 often they are cylindrical, being of diameters from a fraction of one micron to a few 

 microns, rarely more. Except in the groups of myxobacteria and spirochaets, they 

 are walled; the thickness of the walls is of the order of 0.02^ (Knasyi, 1944). The 

 walls may contain cellulose, but consist chiefly of pectates, compounds of slightly 

 oxidized polysaccharides with sulfate, calcium, and magnesium (Kylin, 1943). These 

 compounds are readily rendered gelatinous by hydration or hydrolysis, and the cells 

 are often imbedded in gelatinous layers called sheaths or capsules. 



In describing the Mychota as lacking nuclei, one commits himself to one side of a 

 controversy of many years duration. Because of the greater size of the cells of the 

 blue-green algae, the facts are more easily ascertained in this group than in the proper 

 bacteria. 



The cells of blue-green algae (Gardner, 1906; Swellengrebel, 1910; Haupt, 1923) 

 are divided into outer and inner parts which are not sharply distinct. Pigments occur 

 in a dissolved or colloidal condition in the outer part, which contains also granules 

 of stored food. The granules are not carbohydrate, although a form of glycogen dis- 

 tinct from that of higher organisms has been extracted (Gardner; Kylin, 1943). The 

 inner part contains rods and granules, some of which stain like chromatin, while 

 others ("red granules of Biitschli") are stained red by methylene blue. Cell division 

 is by constriction. Olive (1904) interpreted the inner part of the cell as a nucleus 

 continually in process of mitosis, and accordingly without a membrane. It is true that 

 in series of disk-shaped cells one may recognize series of corresponding granules. 

 Where the cells are more elongate, the rods and granules of the interior are divided 

 at random. Haupt expressed the impropriety of calling any part of these cells a 

 nucleus. 



