Humans like to think big. But if we look closer, a whole miniature world full of infinitesimal creatures is revealed. Tiny, single-celled organisms of all shapes and sizes are hiding in every habitat we explore from seawater to sand to soil. And genetic technologies are giving Hakai researchers a new window into this microscopic world where they are discovering a plethora of new species, sometimes in unexpected places.
“It’s very exciting. You can find something which has never been described before,” says Thierry Heger, a Hakai post-doctoral scholar at the University of British Columbia.
Heger’s research focuses on protists, a group of single-celled creatures that includes amoebas and diatoms. Protists may only have one cell, but their internal structure is more complex than bacteria.
How many protist species live in one area?
It was not previously possible to study the myriad species of protists across a whole area like a watershed. There were just too many species for taxonomists to describe. However, now scientists like Heger don’t need the whole creature to describe them. He just needs a piece of their DNA.
“We didn’t [used to] have the tools to study the enormous diversity of protists. Now [with genetic technologies] we have the possibility to do that,” says Heger.
Heger collects samples from up and down the Kwakshua watershed on the Central Coast of British Columbia from the bog to the forest to the ocean. Genetic material from these samples is analyzed using a technique called “high-throughput DNA sequencing.” By using their DNA, Heger can identify what protist species live in each habitat in the watershed—a comprehensive study that has never been done before in the region.
