Talk:Cryptomonad

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Number of Species

This page should say how many species there are in the phylum. --Savant13 20:02, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Protists

Shouldn't we mention the protoctists (or protists) here? An "alga" without plastid is strictly speaking not an alga, right? StefanTerwijk (talk) 19:24, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you are asking. The classification here is quite new, and somewhat uncertain. But as noted at Protist, the Chromalveolata are a subcategory of the protists (same with the Hacrobia, probably, whether or not it is considered part of the Chromalveolata). But "protist" isn't particularly used in most recent classifications. Kingdon (talk) 21:58, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

New Phylogenetic Classification

Cryptomonads are now thought to be a very basal lineage of the Streptophytes (Kim, E & L Graham. 2008. EEF2 analysis challenges the monophyly of Archaeplastida and Chromalveolata. PLOS One 3(7): e2621.). This view is now widely accepted, even by those who formerly advocated for a single primary plastid endosymbiosis event (personal communication with L Graham, 2012). --Jjknack1 (talk) 01:50, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

You can add the information by sourcing it to a reliable published article that incorporates it. This can be done by looking at the citations for the original journal article. Eau (talk) 02:49, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

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Regarding Article Name/Scientific Classification

While I originally believed the designation of Cryptomonads under "Cryptomonada" perfectly appropriate for the article, I no longer believe this to be the case and would prefer to see it (as well as other wiki articles referencing Cryptomonads) changed to "Cryptophyceae", except in any cases where the former designation is neccesary (such as material concerning historical changes in classification). Given that such a name/classification change would affect dozens of articles, I would prefer to get feedback from other editors before making this change to other relevant articles, though I have made the change in the main article.

My methodology is not really scientific, but I believe it sufficient for this purpose. The search terms for possible scientific IDs were put into Google Scholar, and English-language articles using the term between 2013 and 2019 were counted, from the first five pages of results than Google Scholar returned. This count found that Cryptophyta is much more common in recent scientific literature than Cryptomonada.

Doing this, I found only 4 examples using Cryptomonada, but 43 examples using Cryptophyceae. I find User:NessieVL's concern well founded.

Thereppy (talk) 06:06, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

Requested move 25 May 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: No consensus. Several matters are discussed, but overall there's no consensus for any particular course of action, and discussion has been silent for two weeks. — Amakuru (talk) 12:39, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

– In the 2010s, 'Cryptophyte' has surpassed 'Cryptomonad' as the most common preferred informal term for this group. Roughly 3x the number of results in returned articles by Google Scholar Search. In articles where both terms appear, Cryptophyte is usually printed first, with Cryptomonad often in quotes. Thereppy (talk) 06:13, 25 May 2019 (UTC) --Relisting. Steel1943 (talk) 13:46, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

Move to Cryptophyceae - Cryptophyte is already a disambiguation page, and I think adding a disambiguator like Cryptophyte (alga) would be a lot clunkier than just using the official name. The other uses may also be influencing the search hits as well. --Nessie (talk) 15:15, 25 May 2019 (UTC)
Comment. To editors Thereppy and Nessie: the target page, "Cryptophyte", will need to be moved to allow "Cryptomonad" to be moved there, so it has been added to this request. See also the new article, Cryptomonada (rewrite of Cryptomonad?). Paine Ellsworth, ed. ^put'r there 07:27, 27 May 2019 (UTC)
Comment. I think the wikipedia taxonomy of these and related organisms should be sorted out before any moves are made. A few comments:

There is also a Cryptomonada article.

Cryptophyta is not necessarily a synonym of Cryptophyceae (although it is in Adl et al, 2019).

In the Cryptomonada article, which uses a manual taxobox, it is a superclass containing classes Cryptophyceae and Goniomonadea.

In the automated taxonomy template system, {{Taxonomy/Cryptophyta}} has a single child, Cryptophyceae.

In Silar (2016)^[1] Cryptophyta contains Cryptophyceae and Goniomonaphyceae.

This brings us back to the question of what taxonomy is followed for Eukayotes. As a further point, if Cryptophyte needs disambiguation, then use the taxon name, Cryptophyta. Jts1882 | talk 15:55, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

I now see what Thereppy is intending with the new article for the group containing Goniomonadea and Cryptophyceae (the actual subject of the Cryptomonad article). This new article is the one that needs a decision on the title, Cryptomonada or Cryptophyta. Then the current Cryptomonad article can be moved to Cryptophyceae. Jts1882 | talk 16:06, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

The new article is intended to describe Cryptomonada sensu. Cavalier-Smith 1989 (Cryptophyceae+Goniomonadea), as the current 'Cryptomonad' article only describes the Cryptophyceae. The cell-scheme image, for instance, includes 3 organelles not found in Gongiomonas or Hemiarmida. I believe the best option is to keep (with a few revisions) the current 'Cryptomonad' article, but move it to 'Cryptophyceae' (I have already done this), with the new article 'Cryptomonada' being moved to 'Cryptomonad'. 'Cryptophyceae' might be moved to 'Cryptophyte' per WP:COMMONNAME, with the current disambiguation page there being moved to Cryptophyte (disaumbiguation), but this decision might not be appropriate if the other two meanings of 'Cryptophyte' see comparable levels of use.Thereppy (talk) 12:48, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

I think Cryptophyte as article title is best avoided. Apart from the need to disambiguate from the life-form category, Cryptophyta is used in two senses. Silar uses it as a synonym of Cryptomonada (Cryptophyceae+Goniomonadea), while others restrict it to Cryptophyceae (e.g. Adl et al (2012, 2019) after Cavalier-Smith 1986).

Which classification are you using for your changes? Is it Cavalier-Smith (2018)? The different articles seem to use a contradictory mix. This would be a good time to make a decision for Hacrobia taxa and convert to automatic taxoboxes. Jts1882 | talk 13:54, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Currently I'm not using a particular classification scheme, but going off of the taxoboxes of the lowest-ranked parent taxa which already has a Wiki article, then filling in any remaining info required. This does lead to inconsistencies and...honestly I feel really dumb for not realizing automatic taxoboxes were a thing before. Definitely a preferable alternative. As for whether Cryptista should be classified under "Hacrobia", I lean against as most studies in the past 5 years have failed to support the clade. I think it would be better to have the Cryptista put under Diaphoretickes, maaaaybe with "?Hacrobia" kept as well to denote the uncertainty of that clade. Thereppy (talk) 05:06, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

For Wikipedia we should primarily be following reliable secondary sources (WP:RSPRIMARY). This means we should be following taxonomic reviews, rather than the conclusions of primary reports on the phylogeny, which to me means the taxoboxes should follow one of the systems described in Ruggieri et al 2015, Silar 2016, Cavalier-Smith 2018, or Adl et al 2019 (there is also Tedersoo et al 2017). The individual studies (e.g. Burki 2016, Brown 2018, Lax et al 2018, Strassert et al 2019) showing Cryptista and Haptista in various places can be discussed in the text. I agree with your conclusion on Hacrobia, and I think Adl et al 2019 would be an appropriate source for your suggestion (at least for the hierarchy). Placing Cryptista under Diaphoretickes is relatively uncontroversial and avoids a choice between Hacrobia and an expanded Archaeplastida, which can be discussed in the article text. However, previous attempts to get agreement on which source to follow for major Eurkaryote groupings failed to get consensus and the Adl et al 2019 scheme in particular was deemed too recent or even dismissed (incorrectly in my view) as a primary source (see Request for comment: new classification scheme for eukaryotes). Jts1882 | talk 12:34, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for bringing Adl et al to my attention. It's a very recent scheme, which makes me skeptical that it's the most appropriate for any encyclopedia, but it follows recent developments in Cryptist & Haptist phylogenies much better than any other classification scheme. Cavalier-Smith's 2018 classification scheme is interesting (especially with regard to the Excavates), but conflicts pretty badly with many phylogenetic studies and phylogenies argued by other authors. Ruggiero et al 2015 is mostly good but, owing pretty much entirely to more recent research, falls short for the Cryptists. I'm genuinely unsure whether it would be better to go with Ruggiero or Adl for Wikipedia's current usage, but think Cavalier-Smith can be safely(ish) ruled out for now. Thereppy (talk) 16:38, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Adl et al (2019) shouldn't be considered in isolation as a "new" scheme. It is the third edition (after Adl et al 2005 and 2012) of a collaborative effort involving a number of people working on eukaryote phylogeny. This is why I feel their hierarchy is most suitable, but you can see lack of consensus in the previous discussion I linked to. The biggest problem is their abandonment of linnean ranks. There would be considerable opposition to Wikipedia following suite and how do we choose ranks to go with the Adl heirarchy without venturing into original research. Cavalier-Smith is always interesting as he keeps changing his scheme so often and doesn't mind being different. Ruggiero is the backbone used on a variety of other projects (ITIS, CoL) but is very dated in some areas (e.g. mammals), but might be a safe option for higher ranked taxa of Eukayotes. I think this needs broader discussion to get consensus, but as the last discussion on the Tree of Life project was only four months ago (Feb) perhaps it should wait a few more months. Jts1882 | talk 17:13, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

One further comment. I don't think we can say that Cavalier-Smith can be safely(ish) ruled out if we use the Ruggiero scheme. Protozoa, Chromista, Sulcozoa and other paraphyletic phyla are all part of the system. As one of the authors he is very influential in Ruggiero scheme. Jts1882 | talk 09:53, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

References

[1]
Silar, Philippe (2016), "Protistes Eucaryotes: Origine, Evolution et Biologie des Microbes Eucaryotes", HAL Archives-ouvertes: 1–462

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Cryptophyceae

The first paragraph of the first section of this article and that of Cryptophyceae is almost identical. The differences I found:

The first word is "Cryptomonads" and "Cryptophytes", respectively.
Cryptophyceae does not contain that ejectosomes are also called ejectisomes.

I don't know if this has to belong to both articles. Alfa-ketosav (talk) 13:03, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

See the move discussion just above, which started almost five years ago and reached no consensus. Perhaps it's time to renew that discussion and decide on the best classification for organising articles and taxoboxes. @Snoteleks: Any thoughts? — Jts1882 | talk 13:56, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

Well, I knew this day would come. Phylum Cryptista is a big inconsistent mess. There are generally two competing classifications. On one hand we have Cavalier-Smith's (doi:10.1007/s00709-017-1147-3 with corrections from doi:10.1007/s00709-021-01665-7) version, which seems to prevail among cryptophyte wikipedia articles:

Supphylum Palpitia (Palpitomonas)
Subphylum Rollomonadia
- Superclass Cryptomonada
  - Class Cryptophyceae
  - Class Goniomonadea
- Superclass Leucocrypta (class Leucocryptea)
Supphylum Endohelia (class Endohelea) → complete lack of genetic data.

On the other we have Adl et al.'s (doi:10.1111/jeu.12691) classification, which does not use Cryptomonada and ignores Endohelea for lack of data:

Palpitomonas
Cryptophyceae (=Cryptophyta, Cavalier-Smith's Rollomonadia)
- Cryptomonadales (=Cavalier-Smith's Cryptophyceae)
- Cyathomonadacea (=Cavalier-Smith's Goniomonadea)
- Kathablepharidacea (=Cavalier-Smith's Leucocryptea)

There seems to be some consensus among third-party sources (e.g., doi:10.1111/jeu.12327) where the Cryptomonada are regarded as the clade uniting the photosynthetic cryptophytes with Goniomonadea/Cyathomonadea but excluding Leucocryptea/Kathablepharidacea. Adl et al. do not recognize this clade for some reason. The common name 'cryptomonad' seems to refer more commonly to this higher group than to the order Cryptomonadales alone. Third-party sources also use Cryptophyta as all Cryptista except Palpitomonas and Endohelia. Seeing this, I suggest this scheme for the cryptomonad/cryptophyceae articles, sort of a mixture of both classifications:

Cryptista (phylum)

Palpitomonas (subphylum Palpitia, class Palpitea, etc.)
Endohelea (subphylum Endohelia)
Cryptophyta (currently redirects to Cryptophyceae) → either redirect to Cryptista or make it be its own article, but it cannot be the same as Cryptophyceae. Also we could make it be a subphylum, just like Rollomonadia would be.
- Katablepharid (superclass Leucocrypta, class Kathablepharidacea, etc.)
- Cryptomonad (superclass Cryptomonada)
  - Cryptophyceae (class) → Cryptomonadales appears to be the only order. As seen in both Adl et al. and Daugbjerg et al. (doi:10.1111/jpy.12766), all other orders seen in Wikipedia (e.g., Pyrenomonadales) have been lowered to family rank inside Cryptomonadales (e.g., Pyrenomonadaceae). In fact, Wikipedia is actually committing WP:OR here, because Baffinellaceae appears as a subdivision in the taxobox of the Pyrenomonadales article, but Baffinellaceae was described for the first time in Daugbjerg et al. and assigned to Cryptomonadales along with all other families. Not sure what's happened to Tetragonidiales/Tetragonidiaceae, because it is no longer considered in newer works, but in older works (such as Bourrelly, see here) Tetragonidiales and Cryptomonadales were the only two orders considered in Cryptophyceae. Presumably we could carry on having these two orders be the children taxa of Cryptophyceae and none else.
  - Goniomonadea (class) → should be moved to Cyathomonadacea as it was described decades earlier than Goniomonadea.

In short, I suggest for cryptomonad to be kept as referring to the whole Cryptomonada, for Cryptophyceae to be merged with Cryptomonadales, and for Cryptophyta to be made its own article (which would also be separate from the cryptophyte disambiguation page) as it is not the same as Cryptophyceae. — Snoteleks (talk) 17:27, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

By the way, in case I did not stress it enough, the use that Adl et al. gives to Cryptophyceae is uncommon. It is also definitely better to call it Cryptophyta, because we cannot have classes inside classes. — Snoteleks (talk) 17:33, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

P.S. I found an article (doi:10.1111/j.1095-8339.1993.tb01886.x) corroborating that Tetragonidiales have, in fact, a very uncertain taxonomic position, even when Pyrenomonadales was still an order. In addition, sources (doi:10.1016/j.cub.2020.08.101) admit that the internal cryptomonad phylogeny is very much a work in progress. — Snoteleks (talk) 17:45, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I may be half a year late, but while "we cannot have classes inside classes," Adl et al. also say that phyla and classes are only informally assigned as phyla and classes, and are only used as "a point of reference" (quote from Adl et al. (2019)). Alfa-ketosav (talk) 10:57, 26 November 2024 (UTC)

True, but in any case the usage given to the name Cryptophyta in Adl et al. is quite unpopular, as usually katablepharids are excluded, and the name itself has a very convoluted history. For simplicity, I think Rollomonadia is the best alternative, and keeping 'cryptophyte' a synonym of 'cryptomonad' (see bottom comment of the thread). — Snoteleks (talk) 14:29, 26 November 2024 (UTC)

Also, I'd add that I found that the article says cryptophytes were primitively heterotrophic and acquired plastids secondarily according to molecular evidence, but "molecular evidence" is not stated anywhere in Cryptophyceae. Also, Cryptophyta is stated to be sister to katablepharids, while Cryptophyceae is stated to be sister to either green algae or green algae + Glaucophyta, again, a key difference.

Also, both groups are claimed to be used by Ehrenberg in 1831 and that both were used as the order Cryptomonadina. Alfa-ketosav (talk) 17:45, 25 May 2024 (UTC)

The thing is, the Cryptophyta is not even sister to katablepharids in any published classification. Also, the article states that Cryptophyceae is related to green algae and glaucophytes because the phylogenetic analysis only includes Cryptophyceae. Newer analyses include all of Cryptista as related to Archaeplastida (see Microheliella). — Snoteleks (talk) 18:13, 25 May 2024 (UTC)

And yes, for a long time cryptomonad meant the same thing as cryptophyte, only used by protozoologists and phycologists respectively. Later on, the two terms were separated. — Snoteleks (talk) 18:14, 25 May 2024 (UTC)

Actually I take it back. After some research, it seems that cryptophyte = cryptomonad according to an overwhelming amount of sources (see e.g. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-28149-0_35 or the Illustrated Guide to the Protozoa chapter), and that Adl et al. including the katablepharids within cryptophytes is a very uncommon thing. Both should be the same page. Of course, Cryptophyceae is still only one of the two groups of cryptophytes/cryptomonads, so they should still be a separate page. Knowing this, I will swap 'Cryptophyta' with the more accepted 'Rollomonadia' because 'Cryptophyta' would equate to Cryptomonada, which is a taxon inside of Rollomonadia. — Snoteleks (talk) 17:01, 26 May 2024 (UTC)

Requested move 1 March 2026

It has been proposed in this section that Cryptomonad be renamed and moved to Cryptophyte.

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Cryptomonad → Cryptophyte – The two division (phylum) (Cryptophyta and Katablepharidophyta, proposed in Okamoto, 2005) classification of rollomonads is more common, also, Cavalier-Smith uses an order Kathablepharida and family Kathablepharidae (see https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1550-7408.1993.tb06117.x and also https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0130114), and Kathablepharidae is invalid under the ICZN (see https://doi.org/10.1016/S1434-4610(99)70008-8). See Okamoto, 2005 and more sources using two divisions: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.protis.2004.12.003, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.algal.2026.104535, https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2022.999886, https://doi.org/10.1002/lno.70263, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2023.111350 and https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2025.118217. Not fully sure how we would handle other cryptist taxa though, Tetrahelia could be a problem. Jako96 (talk) 13:00, 1 March 2026 (UTC) — Relisting. Jeffrey34555 (talk) 17:42, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

Oppose, the vernacular name "Cryptomonad" is widely accepted and not controversial. The name "Cryptophyte" not only is the same for an unrelated botanical term, but also has too many different meanings (from all of Cryptista to only the class Cryptophyceae which excludes Goniomonadea). — Snoteleks (talk) 22:24, 1 March 2026 (UTC)

That's a good point, but still, do you support to use two division for Rollomonadia? Cavalier-Smith uses Kathablepharida and Kathablepharidae under the Leucocryptea, but the family name is invalid under the ICZN, I showed a source above (it says the order name is invalid, but it must be a typo). Jako96 (talk) 14:34, 2 March 2026 (UTC)

As far as I have seen there is no other taxon name besides Rollomonadia that maintains the distinction between ejectisome-bearing cryptists (katablepharids and cryptomonads) and ejectisome-lacking cryptists (Palpitomonas), so I would maintain it for now. Hopefully someone publishes a newer more coherent classification soon. — Snoteleks (talk) 14:35, 4 March 2026 (UTC)

What do you think about the order and family-level names then? The order should be Kathablepharida and the family should be Kathablepharidae now, since we are following CS. Again, note that these names are invalid under the ICZN. Jako96 (talk) 15:59, 4 March 2026 (UTC)

If sources don't care about the "ejectisome situation", we shouldn't care about it either, nor it's a good reason for WP:SYNTH, which we can't assign Kathablepharidida to Leucocryptea. Jako96 (talk) 19:58, 4 March 2026 (UTC)

What do you mean by "don't care"? There's plenty of sources talking about the ejectisome being a unique feature evolved only in the clade containing katablepharids and cryptomonads, for example doi:10.1038/srep04641 — Snoteleks (talk) 18:32, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

I understand that we should prioritize a consensed non-WP:SYNTH hierarchy, so not following CS would be preferable here due to the invalidity of some names. But on the other hand, none of the non-CS sources are coherent with each other.

I need some more time to come up with an informed opinion on this. There's just too many inconsistencies among non-CS sources using the term "cryptophyta" to refer to either only photosynthetic cryptomonads (so Cryptophyceae), or Cryptophyceae+Goniomonadea, or Cryptophyceae+Goniomonadea+Kathablepharida. I will check more carefully to see if there is an informed consensus. If there is, we can hopefully move Kathablepharida and Cryptophyta/Cryptomonada to phylum level following Okamoto et al., and have all valid names. — Snoteleks (talk) 21:01, 4 March 2026 (UTC)

Okay, after some thought for now it seems adequate to follow the sources you provided. I propose the following, non-synthetic hierarchy:

Cryptista (clade) ← merge Rollomonadia into it, explaining the ejectisome evolution in its article
- Tetrahelia as incertae sedis (maybe even under Pancryptista)
- Palpitea (class)
- Kathablepharida (phylum)
- Cryptophyta (phylum/division) ← this article, maintaining "Cryptomonad" as title
  - Goniomonadea (class)
  - Cryptophyceae (class)

— Snoteleks (talk) 18:50, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

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