Table I.

Morphological characteristics of microgametocytes of mammalian haemosporidians (Landau et al., 1976, modified).

	Type of microgametocyte
Morphological characteristic	falciparum	malariae	vivax
Filling completely or almost the host RBC	no	no	yes
Form	ellipsoidal or elongate	rounded	rounded
Eccentric nucleus	no	no	yes
Distinct limit between nucleus and cytoplasm	no	yes	yes
Accessory chromatin dot	frequent	frequent	absent
Distinct border between nucleus and pigmented zone	no	no	yes
Pigment granules	few and coarse	Few and coarse	fine and abundant
Distribution of pigment	irregular, often grouped	irregular, often grouped	dispersed