- permanent photosynthetic endosymbiont
- facultative photosymbiont
- kleptoplasty
- temporary retention of prey chloroplasts
Operational definition
Dependency and trophic category.
Phototrophic capacity obtained by retaining a photosynthetic organism, plastid, or phototrophic biological component acquired from another lineage.
It includes:
- photosymbiosis;
- temporary chloroplast retention;
- kleptoplasty;
- incompletely integrated endosymbiosis.
For this operational category, permanent plastids inherited as fully integrated organelles are classified as intrinsic cellular phototrophic machinery rather than repeatedly “acquired phototrophy,” although they originated evolutionarily through endosymbiosis.