Zoologger: Unique life form is half plant, half animal

These hybrids play merry hell with our attempts to classify organisms into neat groups. “The division between plants and animals is collapsing completely,” Moestrup says. Instead, many microorganisms may be animal and plant at once, or switch between the two, like M. rubrum. The new M. chamaeleon breaks yet another barrier. It is halfway between a pure animal and a hybrid.