304 THE BIOLOGY OF STENTOR 



original membranellar band, occurred only if nuclear beads were 

 present (Tartar, i959d). 



12. Survival of enucleates 



Gruber, Balbiani, Prowazek, and Schwartz reported survival 

 times of from 32 hours to 3 days. Demonstrating his main theme, 

 Schwartz (1935) found that survival of coeruleus in which the 

 macronucleus has been removed was not aided or extended by the 

 presence of i to 16 micronuclei, again proving the indifferent 

 character of these tiny nuclei with respect to vegetative functions. 

 His enucleates lived for a much shorter period than starved controls 

 which remained alive for a week. Therefore he concluded that 

 death was not due to starvation but to some disturbance of the 

 entire metabolism in the absence of the macronucleus. 



I have found that the tiniest blebs of ciliated cytoplasm separated 

 off in abnormal division of coeruleus can live for a little more than 

 5 hours. Larger enucleated fragments lived for about 3 to 4 days, 

 and the largest enucleates generally lived for 4 days when isolated 

 in depression slides, though some survived for 6. It is not uncom- 

 mon to find enucleated stentors living as long as starved controls 

 (Tartar, 1956c). One wonders, then, whether enucleates may not 

 die merely from exhaustion of reserves rather than disturbed 

 metabolism. 



13. Consequences of excess nucleus 



Stentor fragments and fusion complexes with an unusually high 

 proportion of macronuclear material in relation to the cytoplasmic 

 volume can be produced by cutting all the nucleus into one small 

 fragment, forcing all the nucleus at division into one daughter cell, 

 or grafting together sectors of several cells bearing most of their 

 nuclei. Effects of this artificial alteration of the nucleo-cytoplasmic 

 ratio in favor of the nucleus can be followed because, though neat 

 studies of nuclear volume would be difficult and are lacking, there 

 is no evidence or impression that excess nuclear material is quickly 

 and adaptively resorbed in any way comparable to the speed with 

 which the macronuclear chain is regenerated after all but a few 

 nodes are removed. This statement corresponds closely to the 

 observations of Schwartz (1935). 



Both Prowazek (1904) and Causin (1931) noted that coeruleus 



