INTRODUCTION 



is all the more imperative because it has been so grossly 

 neglected. 



The play of environmental forces demands the continuous 

 adjustment, balance and discrimination of the living thing. 

 How this self-regulation comes about constitutes a great 

 problem in biology. Not less capable is the power of self- 

 differentiation exhibited by the living system. Against and 

 with the outside world, repelling and responding, it makes 

 itself anew, exhibits a series of events in sequence and 

 order ever the same. Self-regulation and self-differentia- 

 tion are fundamental expressions of the organization of 

 living matter. 



As an integral part of the protoplasmic structure the 

 ectoplasm can not be divorced from this. The proto- 

 plasmic organization however much a composite of many 

 parts — nucleus with its structures and cytoplasm with its 

 regions — acts as a unit. To conceive it as such is to 

 approach an understanding of those series of moving events 

 that we call life. The ectoplasm, standing between the 

 protoplasmic system's inner substance and the outside 

 world, reacts first to environmental stimuli and thus condi- 

 tions the responses of the whole system. Its rapidly occur- 

 ring, highly active structural changes portray self-regula- 

 tion and self-differentiation. Thus by its location and by 

 its peculiar attributes, the ectoplasm becomes the most 

 tangible expression of life-processes. 



