Bioflash: "One Cell, One World"

The freshwater paramecium is a mobile, microscopic metropolis. In this cellular economy, the nucleus is the capitol, governing transport and protein construction.

Yet it doesn’t know. Its world is a slide on a microscope, its lifespan the attention span of a scientist.

Against water—its very home—the paramecium wages war. Water, made toxic by its abundance, leaks through every wall, constantly being bailed out.

On the transparent desert, the light always burns.

Thousands of oar-like cilia propel the protist forward, its oral groove vacuuming nutrients. Trapped between glass, the paramecium continues its search, eclipsed by an even greater curiosity.

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