Analysis of Paint it Blue 2

An agglutination of 100,000 Myxococcus xanthus; a “species of myxobacteria that exhibits various forms of self-organizing behavior in response to environmental cues. Under normal conditions with abundant food, it exists as a predatory, saprophytic single-species biofilm called a swarm. A swarm of M. xanthus is a distributed system, containing millions of bacteria that communicate among themselves in a non-centralized fashion. Simple patterns of cooperative behavior among the members of the colony combine to generate complex group behaviors in a process known as "stigmergy". For example, the tendency for one cell to glide only when in direct contact with another results in the colony forming swarms called "wolf-packs" that may measure up to several inches wide.” - Wikipedia

“Formless protoplasm able to mock and reflect all forms and organs and processes – viscous agglutinations of bubbling cells – rubbery, fifteen-foot spheroids infinitely plastic and ductile – slaves of suggestion, builders of cities – more and more sullen, more and more intelligent, more and more amphibious, more and more imitative! Great God! What madness made even those blasphemous Old Ones willing to use and carve such things?

And now, when Danforth and I saw the freshly glistening and reflectively iridescent black slime which clung thickly to those headless bodies and stank obscenely with that new, unknown odor whose cause only a diseased fancy could envision...” (1)

“It was a terrible indescribable thing vaster than any subway train - a shapeless congeries of protoplasmic bubbles, faintly forming as pustules of greenish light over the tunnel filling front that bore down upon us, crushing the frantic penguins and slithering over the glistening floor that it and its kind had swept so evilly free of all litter. Still came the eldritch mocking cry – “Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!” (2)

The structure of a typical myovirus bacteriophage

Structural model at atomic resolution of bacteriophage T 4

Citations

1 - H. P., Lovecraft. "At The Mountains of Madness." The Transition of H P Lovecraft. Del Rey, 1996. Page 339. Print. 

2 - Ibid, p 334.