Fast Fauna Facts #25 - Pinnularia (Pinnularia spp.)
Family: Pinnularia Family (Pinnulariaceae)
IUCN Conservation Status: Unassessed
Found mainly in freshwater but also in marine environments and occasionally in damp terrestrial habitats, the members of the genus Pinnularia are diatoms - single celled organisms characterised by their protective silica-based glass-like cell walls known as frustules. Like plants diatoms sustain themselves entirely through photosynthesis and absorb sunlight via deposits of the green pigment chlorophyll in their cell bodies, and as the glass-like transparent structure of a diatom's frustule protects it from predators and adverse environmental conditions while still allowing sunlight to reach the cell's chlorophyll. Like plants diatoms also need certain inorganic molecules (mainly carbon and hydrogen to act as reactants during photosynthesis and nitrogen to produce proteins such as chlorophyll) to survive, and Pinnularia species these are taken in through tiny pores that run through the frustule.
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