PHYLUM CTENOPHORA

➢ Animals in the phylum Ctenophora (ti-nofer-ah) (Gr. kteno, comb phoros, to

bear) are called sea walnuts or comb jellies.
➢ The approximately 90 described species are all marine.
➢ Most ctenophorans have a spherical form, although several groups are
flattened and/or elongate.
➢ They are notable for the groups of cilia they use for swimming (commonly
referred to as "combs").
Characteristics of the phylum Ctenophora include:
1. Diploblastic, tissue-level organization.
2. Biradial symmetry.
3. Gelatinous mesoglea between the epidermal and gastrodermal tissue layers.
4. Gastrovascular cavity.
5. Nervous system in the form of a nerve net.
6. Adhesive structures called colloblasts.
7. Eight rows of ciliary bands, called comb rows, for locomotion.

8. Almost all ctenophores function as predators, taking prey ranging from

microscopic larvae and rotifers to the adults of small crustaceans.
9. Among animal phyla, the Ctenophores are more complex than sponges,
about as complex as cnidarians (jellyfish, sea anemones, etc.), and less
complex than bilaterians (which include almost all other animals).
 10. Like sponges and cnidarians, ctenophores have two main layers of cells
that sandwich a middle layer of jelly-like material, which is called the
mesoglea in cnidarians and ctenophores.
11.Hence ctenophores and cnidarians have traditionally been labelled
diploblastic, along with sponges.
Body layers:
1. Like those of cnidarians, (jellyfish, sea anemones, etc.), ctenophores' bodies consist of a
relatively thick, jelly-like mesoglea sandwiched between two epithelia.
2. The epithelia of ctenophores have two layers of cells rather than one, and some of the
cells in the upper layer have several cilia per cell.
3. The outer layer of the epidermis (outer skin) consists of: sensory cells; cells that secrete
mucus, which protects the body.
4. In specialized parts of the body, the outer layer also contains colloblasts, found along
the surface of tentacles and used in capturing prey.
5. The inner layer of the epidermis contains a nerve net, and myoepithelial cells that act as
muscles.
6. The internal cavity forms: a mouth that can usually be closed by muscles; a pharynx
("throat"); a wider area in the center that acts as a stomach; and a system of internal
canals.

B. C. A.
7. Branch through the mesoglea to the most active parts of the animal: the mouth and
pharynx; the roots of the tentacles, if present; all along the underside of each comb
row; and four branches around at the far end from the mouth – two of these four
branches terminate in anal pores.
8. Inner surface of the cavity is lined with an epithelium, the gastrodermis. The mouth and
pharynx have both cilia and well-developed muscles
9. In other parts of the canal system, the gastrodermis is different on the sides nearest to
and furthest from the organ that it supplies.
10.The nearer side is composed of tall nutritive cells that store nutrients in vacuoles
(internal compartments), germ cells that produce eggs or sperm, and photocytes that
produce bioluminescence.
11.The side furthest from the organ is covered with ciliated cells that circulate water
through the canals.
Feeding, excretion and respiration:
1. Ingestion occurs as the tentacles wipe the prey across the mouth.
2. When prey is swallowed, it is liquefied in the pharynx by enzymes and by
muscular contractions of the pharynx.
3. Resulting slurry is wafted through the canal system by the beating of the
cilia, and digested by the nutritive cells.
4. Some canals are blind; however, two small anal canals open to the outside
near the apical sense organ.
5. Thus, unlike the cnidarians, ctenophores have an anal opening.
6. Some undigested wastes are eliminated through these canals, and some are
probably also eliminated through the mouth.
Locomotion:
1. The outer surface bears usually eight comb rows, called swimming-plates,
which are used for swimming.
2. Comb rows are locomotor structures that are coordinated through a
statocyst at the aboral pole.
3. Rows are oriented to run from near the mouth (the "oral pole") to the
opposite end (the "aboral pole"), and are spaced more or less evenly around
the body.
4. Although spacing patterns vary by species and in most species the comb
rows extend only part of the distance from the aboral pole towards the
mouth. The "combs" (also called "ctenes" or "comb plates") run across each
 row, and each consists of thousands of unusually long cilia, up to 2
millimeters (0.08 in).
5. These normally beat so that the propulsion stroke is away from the mouth,
although they can also reverse direction. Hence ctenophores usually swim in
the direction in which the mouth is eating.
Nervous system and senses:
1. Ctenophores have no brain or central nervous system, but instead have a
subepidermal nerve net (rather like a cobweb) that forms a ring round the
mouth and is densest near structures such as the comb rows, pharynx,
tentacles (if present)
2. The largest single sensory feature is the aboral organ (at the opposite end
from the mouth), which is underlined with its own nerve net
3. This organ's main component is a statocyst, a balance sensor that sense its
orientation.
Reproduction:
1. Adults of most species can regenerate tissues that are damaged or removed.
2. Some are simultaneous hermaphrodites, which can produce both eggs and
sperm at the same time, while others are sequential hermaphrodites, in
which the eggs and sperm mature at different times.
3. The gonads are located in the parts of the internal canal network under the
comb rows, and eggs and sperm are released via pores.
4. Fertilization is generally external, but a few uses internal fertilization.
5. Development of the fertilized eggs is direct; there is no distinctive larval form
called cydippid larvae. Juveniles of all groups are generally planktonic.
6. At least in some species, juvenile ctenophores appear capable of producing
small quantities of eggs and sperm while they are well.
 Colors and bioluminescence:
1. Most ctenophores that live near the surface are mostly colorless and almost
transparent. However some deeper-living species are strongly pigmented.
2. Platyctenids generally live attached to other sea-bottom organisms, and often
have similar colors to these host organisms.
3. The comb rows of most planktonic ctenophores produce a rainbow effect,
which is not caused by bioluminescence but by the scattering of light as the
combs move.
4. Most species are also bioluminescent, but the light is usually blue or green
and can only be seen in darkness.
Ecological Importance of
Ctenophores: The Black &
Caspian Sea Stories
-- deterioration of the Black Sea
due to eutrophication and
fisheries (bonito, mackarel,
dorado); In 1989 Mnemiopsis
causes crash of anchovy fishery
-- 1997 predatory Ctenophore
Beroe invades the Black sea and
begins to control Mnemiopsis .
-- 1999 Mnemiopsis in the
Caspian Sea threatens kilka
fishery;Iran’s landings down to
15000 tons, an 82 % decrease
by 2004.
-- Has since spread to North Sea
and Baltic Sea, though no one
can explain how.

THE TRIPLOBLASTIC, ACOELOMATE BODY PLAN:

➢ These phyla are phylogenetically important because they are transitional
between radial animals and the more complex bilateral animals. Three
important characteristics appeared initially in this group:
o bilateral symmetry.
o a true mesoderm that gives rise to muscles and other organs.
o a nervous system with a primitive brain and nerve cords.
➢ Acoelomates lack a body cavity because the mesodermal mass completely
fills the area between the outer epidermis and digestive tract.
 PHYLUM PLATYHELMINTHES
1. Phylum Platyhelminthes (Gr. platys, flat helmins, worm).
2. Contains over 20,000 animal species.
3. Flatworms range in adult size from 1 mm or less to 25 m in length.
4. This is the first phylum covered that has an organ-system level of
organization—a significant evolutionary advancement over the tissue
level of organization.
5. The phylum is divided into four classes:
a. Turbellaria consists of mostly free-living flatworms, whereas the
b. Monogenea
c. Trematoda
d. Cestoidea contain solely parasitic species.
Characteristics of the phylum Platyhelminthes:
1. Usually flattened dorsoventrally, triploblastic, acoelomate, bilaterally
symmetrical.
2. Unsegmented worms (members of the class Cestoidea are strobilated).
3. Incomplete gut usually present; gut absent in Cestoidea.
4. Somewhat cephalized, with an anterior cerebral ganglion and usually
longitudinal nerve cords.
5. Protonephridia as excretory/osmoregulatory structures.
6. Hermaphroditic; complex reproductive systems.
CLASS TURBELLARIA: THE FREE-LIVING FLATWORMS
1. Members of the class Turbellaria are mostly free-living bottom dwellers
in freshwater and marine environments.
2. They crawl on stones, sand, or vegetation.
3. Turbellarians are named for the turbulence that their beating cilia
create in the water.
4. Turbellarians are predators and scavengers.
5. The few terrestrial turbellarians known live in the humid tropics and
subtropics.
6. Although most turbellarians are less than 1 cm long, the terrestrial,
tropical ones may reach 60 cm in length.
Body Wall:
1. Ectodermal derivatives include an epidermis that is in direct contact
with the environment.
2. Some epidermal cells are ciliated.
3. A basement membrane of connective tissue separates the epidermis
from mesodermally derived tissues.
4. An outer layer of circular muscle and an inner layer of longitudinal
muscle lie beneath the basement membrane.
5. Between the longitudinal muscles and and the gastrodermis are the
loosely organized parenchymal cells.
6. The innermost tissue layer of gastrodermis comprises the digestive
cavity.
7. Gastrodermis secretes enzymes that aid in digestion, and it absorbs the
end products of digestion.
8. On the ventral surface of the body wall are several types of glandular
cells of epidermal origin:
➢ Rhabdites are rodlike cells that swell and form a protective mucous
sheath around the body, possibly in response to attempted predation
or desiccation.
➢ Adhesive glands produce a chemical that attaches part of the
turbellarian to a substrate.
➢ Releaser glands secrete a chemical that dissolves the attachment as
needed.
Locomotion:
1. Turbellarians are primarily bottom dwellers that glide over the
substrate.
2. They move using cilia and muscular undulations.
3. As they move, turbellarians lay down a sheet of mucus that aids in
adhesion and helps the cilia gain traction.
4. The densely ciliated ventral surface and the flattened body of
turbellarians enhance the effectiveness of this locomotion.
Digestion and Nutrition:
1. Some marine turbellarians lack the digestive cavity characteristic of
other turbellarians.
2. This blind cavity varies from a simple, unbranched chamber to a highly
branched system of digestive tubes.
3. Other turbellarians have digestive tracts that are lobed (figure 10.4c).
4. The turbellarian pharynx functions as an ingestive organ. It varies in
structure from a simple, ciliated tube to a complex organ developed
from the folding of muscle layers.
5. In the latter, the free end of the tube lies in a pharyngeal sheath and can
project out of the mouth when feeding.
|\

(d)
6. Most turbellarians, such as the common planarian, are carnivores and
feed on small, live invertebrates or scavenge on larger, dead animals.
7. Some are herbivores and feed on algae that they scrape from rocks.
8. Sensory cells (chemoreceptors) on their heads help them detect food
from a considerable distance.
Exchanges with the Environment:
1. Turbellarians do not have respiratory organs; thus, respiratory gases
(CO2 and O2) are exchanged by diffusion through the body wall.
2. Most metabolic wastes (e.g., ammonia) are also removed by diffusion
through the body wall.
3. Evolution of osmoregulatory structures in the form of protonephridia.
4. Protonephridia (Gr. protos, first nephros, kidney) (sing.,
protonephridium) are networks of fine tubules that run the length of
the turbellarian, along each of its sides.
5. Numerous, fine side branches of the tubules originate in the parenchyma
as tiny enlargements called flame cells.
6. Flame cells (so named because, in the living organism, they resemble a
candle flame) have numerous cilia that project into the lumen of the
tubule.
7. Slit-like fenestrations (openings) perforate the tubule wall surrounding
the flame cell.
8. The beating of the cilia drives fluid down the tubule, creating a negative
pressure in the tubule.
9. As a result, fluid from the surrounding tissue is sucked through the
fenestrations into the tubule.
10. The tubules eventually merge and open to the outside of the body
wall through a minute opening called a nephridiopore.
 Nervous System and Sense Organs:
1. Most primitive type of flatworm nervous system, found in worms is the
subepidermal nerve plexus; resembles the nerve net of cnidarians.
➢ A statocyst in the anterior end functions as a mechanoreceptor (a
receptor excited by pressure) that detects the turbellarian’s body
position in reference to the direction of gravity.
2. Some turbellarians have a more centralized nerve net with cerebral
ganglia.
3. The nervous system of most other turbellarians, such as the planarian
Dugesia, consists of a subepidermal nerve net and several pairs of long
nerve cords.
➢ Lateral branches called commissures (points of union) connect the
nerve cords.
 ➢ Nerve cords and their commissures give a ladderlike appearance to the
turbellarian nervous system.
➢ Anteriorly, the nervous tissue concentrates into a pair of cerebral
ganglia (sing., ganglion) called a primitive brain.
4. Auricles (sensory lobes) may project from the side of the head.
5. Turbellarians respond to a variety of stimuli in their external
environment. Many tactile and sensory cells distributed over the body
detect touch, water currents, and chemicals.
6. Chemoreceptors that aid in food location are especially dense in these
auricles.
7. Most turbellarians have two simple eyespots called ocelli (sing., ocellus).
8. These ocelli orient the animal to the direction of light.
9. Most turbellarians are negatively phototactic and move away from light.
 Reproduction and Development:
A. Asexual Reproduction:
1. Fission:
a. Many turbellarians reproduce asexually by transverse fission. Fission
usually begins as a constriction behind the pharynx.
b. Two (or more) animals that result from fission are called zooids (Gr.,
zoon, living being or animal), and they regenerate missing parts after
separating from each other.
B. Sexual Reproduction:
1. Sexual Turbellarians are monoecious.
2. Numerous paired testes lie along each side of the worm and are the
sites of sperm production.
3. Sperm ducts (vas deferens) lead to a seminal vesicle (a sperm storage
organ) and a protrusible penis.
4. The female system has one to many pairs of ovaries. Oviducts lead from
the ovaries to the genital chamber, which opens to the outside through
the genital pore.
5. Even though turbellarians are monoecious, reciprocal sperm exchange
between two animals is usually the rule.
6. Cross-fertilization ensures greater genetic diversity than does self-
fertilization.
7. Eggs are laid with or without a gel-like mass.
8. A hard capsule called a cocoon (L., coccum, eggshell) encloses many
turbellarian eggs.
9. These cocoons attach to the substrate by a stalk and contain several
embryos per capsule.
10. Two kinds of capsules are laid.
a. Summer capsules hatch in two to three weeks, and immature animals
emerge
b. Autumn capsules have thick walls that can resist freezing and drying,
and they hatch after overwintering.
11. Development of most turbellarians is direct—a gradual series of
changes transforms embryos into adults. A few turbellarians have a free-
swimming stage called a Müller’s larva.

CLASS MONOGENEA:
1. Monogenetic flukes are so named because they have only one
generation in their life cycle; that is, one adult develops from one egg.
2. Monogeneans are mostly external parasites (ectoparasites) of
freshwater and marine fishes, where they attach to the gill filaments
and feed on epithelial cells, mucus, or blood.
3. A large, posterior
attachment organ called an
opisthaptor facilitates
attachment.
4. Adult monogeneans produce
and release eggs that have
one or more sticky threads
that attach the eggs to the
fish gill.
5. Eventually, a ciliated larva called an oncomiracidium hatches from the
egg and swims to another host fish, where it attaches by its opisthaptor
and develops into an adult.

CLASS TREMATODA:
1. Approximately eight thousand species of parasitic flatworms in the
class Trematoda (tremah-todah) (Gr. trematodes, perforated form) are
collectively called flukes, which describes their wide, flat shape.
2. Almost all adult flukes are parasites of vertebrates, whereas immature
stages may be found in vertebrates or invertebrates, or encysted on
plants.
3. Many species are of great economic and medical importance.
4. Most flukes are flat and oval to elongate, and range from less than 1 mm
to 6 cm in length.
5. The digestive tract includes a mouth and a muscular, pumping pharynx.
Posterior to the pharynx, the digestive tract divides into two blind-
ending, variously branched pouches called cecae (sing., cecum).
6. Body-wall structure is
similar for all flukes and
represents on
evolutionary
adaptation to the
parasitic way of life.

7. Epidermis consists of
an outer layer called
the tegument, which
forms a syncytium (a
continuous layer of
fused cells).
8. Outer zone of the
tegument consists of an
organic layer of proteins
and carbohydrates
called the glycocalyx.
9. Glycocalyx protects the
fluke against enzymes and the host’s immune system.
10. Also found in this zone are microvilli that facilitate nutrient
exchange.
11. Cytoplasmic bodies that contain the nuclei and most of the
organelles lie below the basement membrane.
12. Slender cell processes called cytoplasmic bridges connect the
cytoplasmic bodies with the outer zone of the tegument.
 Life cycle of Trematodes:
1. Trematodes have a very complex life cycle and depending on what taxa
they belong to; their life cycles can be completed with as little as one
host compared to the typical three hosts.
2. When there is one host, this is normally a specific species of snail of the
family Lymnaeidae.
3. Almost all trematodes infect molluscs as the intermediate host in the life
cycle, and most have a complex life cycle involving other hosts.
4. Most trematodes are monoecious and alternately reproduce sexually
and asexually. The two main exceptions to this are the Aspidogastrea,
which have no asexual reproduction, and the schistosomes, which are
dioecious.
5. In the definitive host, in which sexual reproduction occurs, eggs are
commonly shed along with host feces.
6. Eggs shed in water release free-swimming larval forms (Miracidia) that
are infective to the intermediate host, in which asexual reproduction
occurs.
MEDICALLY IMPORTANT TREMATODES:
 CLASS CESTOIDEA: THE TAPEWORMS
1. Most highly specialized class of flatworms of class Cestoidea (ses-toide-
ah) (Gr. kestos, girdle eidos, form), commonly called either tapeworms or
cestodes.
2. All of the approximately 3,500 species are endoparasites that usually
reside in the vertebrate digestive system.
3. Adult tapeworms range from 1 mm to 25 m in length.
4. Two unique adaptations to a parasitic lifestyle characterize tapeworms:
➢ Tapeworms lack a mouth and digestive tract in all of their life-cycle
stages; they absorb nutrients directly across their body wall
➢ Most adult tapeworms consist of a long series of repeating units
called proglottids.
5. Each proglottid contains a complete set of reproductive structures.
6. Adult tapeworms live in a very stable environment. The vertebrate
intestinal tract has very few environmental variations that would require
the development of great anatomical or physiological complexity in any
single tapeworm body system.
7. The physiology of the tapeworm’s host maintains the tapeworm’s
homeostasis (internal constancy).
8. In adapting to such a specialized environment, tapeworms have lost
some of the structures believed to have been present in ancestral
turbellarians.
9. Tapeworms are, therefore, a good example of evolution not always
resulting in greater complexity.
10. Cestodes are exclusively hermaphrodites, with both male and
female reproductive systems in each body.
11. Reproductive system includes one or more testes, vas deferens, and
seminal vesicles as male organs, and a single lobed or unlobed ovary
with the connecting oviduct and uterus as female organs.
12. The common external opening for both male and female
reproductive systems is known as the genital pore, which is situated at
the surface or lateral sides.
13. Though they are sexually hermaphroditic and cross-fertilization is
the norm, self-fertilization sometimes occurs and makes possible the
reproduction of a worm when it is the only individual in its host's gut.
MEDICALLY IMPORTANT CESTODES: