PHYLUM

PLATYHELMINTH
ES

NSELEC 2 ZOOLOGY
WEEK 8
PREPARED BY: CHRIST JOHN S. SABERON
BACHELOR OF SCIENCE IN PSYCHOLOGY
BESTLINK COLLEGE OF THE PHILIPPINES
 LEARNING OBJECTIVES
At the end of this lesson, you should be able to:
1. Describe organ systems of animals that
belongs to Phylum Platyhelminthes;
2. identify classes of Phylum Platyhelminthes
and specific species under it; and
3. illustrate and Identify parts of a Planaria.
 PHYLUM PLATYHELMINTHES
The flatworms, Platyhelminthes, or Platyhelminths
(from the Greek platy meaning "flat" and helminths
meaning "worm") are a phylum of relatively simple
bilaterian, unsegmented, soft-bodied invertebrates.
Unlike other bilaterians, they are acoelomates (having
no body cavity), and have no specialized circulatory
and respiratory organs, which restricts them to having
flattened shapes that allow oxygen and nutrients to
pass through their bodies by diffusion.
 PHYLUM PLATYHELMINTHES
The Platyhelminthes consist of two
lineages: the Catenulida and the
Rhabditophora.
The Catenulida, or “chain worms” is a
small clade of just over 100 species. These
worms typically reproduce asexually by
budding. However, the offspring do not
fully detach from the parents and therefore
resemble a chain in appearance.
 PHYLUM PLATYHELMINTHES
Rhabditophora It includes all
parasitic flatworms and most free-
living species that were previously
grouped in the now obsolete class
Turbellaria. Therefore, it contains
most of the species in the phylum
Platyhelminthes,
 PHYLUM PLATYHELMINTHES

Flatworms have three embryonic tissue layers that

give rise to surfaces that cover tissues (from
ectoderm), internal tissues (from mesoderm), and
line the digestive system (from endoderm).
 PHYLUM PLATYHELMINTHES

The flatworms are

acoelomates, so their
bodies are solid
between the outer
surface and the cavity
of the digestive system.
 DIGESTIVE SYSTEM

The free-living species of flatworms are

predators or scavengers. Parasitic forms feed on
the tissues of their hosts. Most flatworms have a
gastrovascular cavity rather than a complete
digestive system. In such animals, the “mouth”
is also used to expel waste materials from the
digestive system.
DIGESTIVE SYSTEM
DIGESTIVE SYSTEM
 EXCRETORY SYSTEM

Flatworms have an excretory system with a network

of tubules throughout the body with openings to the
environment and nearby flame cells, whose cilia
beat to direct waste fluids concentrated in the
tubules out of the body. The system is responsible
for the regulation of dissolved salts and the
excretion of nitrogenous wastes.
EXCRETORY SYSTEM
 NERVOUS SYSTEM

The nervous system consists of a pair of nerve

cords running the length of the body with
connections between them and a large ganglion or
concentration of nerves at the anterior end of the
worm, where there may also be a concentration of
photosensory and chemosensory cells.
NERVOUS SYSTEM
 PHYSIOLOGICAL PROCESSES
There is neither a circulatory nor
respiratory system, with gas and
nutrient exchange dependent on
diffusion and cell-cell junctions.
This necessarily limits the thickness
of the body in these organisms,
constraining them to be “flat”
worms.
 CLASS TUBELLARIA

The class Turbellaria includes mainly free-living,

marine species, although some species live in
freshwater or moist terrestrial environments. The
ventral epidermis of turbellarians is ciliated and
facilitates their locomotion. Some turbellarians are
capable of remarkable feats of regeneration in which
they may regrow the body, even from a small
fragment.
 CLASS TURBELLARIA

1. Planarian 1. Pseudobiceros bedfordi

1. Pseudoceros dimidiatus
 CLASS TUBELLARIA

With over 3000 members (species), Turbellaria is a

class of the Phylum Platyhelminthes. As such, they
are multicellular flatworms characterized by
flattened appearance. They can be found in many
aquatic habitats as well as given terrestrial
environments. For this reason, they are very
common and easy to find.
 CLASS MONOGENEA
The monogeneans are ectoparasites, mostly of fish,
with simple lifecycles that consist of a free swimming
larva that attaches to a fish to begin transformation to
the parasitic adult form. The parasite has only one
host and that host is usually only one species. The
worms may produce enzymes that digest the host
tissues or simply graze on surface mucus and skin
particles.
CLASS MONOGENEA
 CLASS TREMATODES
The trematodes, or flukes, are internal parasites of
mollusks and many other groups, including
humans. Trematodes have complex lifecycles that
involve a primary host in which sexual
reproduction occurs, and one or more secondary
hosts in which asexual reproduction occurs. The
primary host is almost always a mollusk.
CLASS TREMATODES
 CLASS CESTODES
The cestodes, or tapeworms, are also internal parasites,
mainly of vertebrates. Tapeworms live in the intestinal
tract of the primary host and remain fixed using a sucker
on the anterior end, or scolex, of the tapeworm body. The
remaining body of the tapeworm is made up of a long
series of units called proglottids, each of which may
contain an excretory system with flame cells, but contain
reproductive structures, both male and female.
CLASS CESTODES
CLASS CESTODES
 REPRODUCTION
With very few exceptions, platyhelminthes are
hermaphroditic, and their reproductive systems are
generally complex. Numerous testes but only one or
two ovaries are usually present in these flatworms.
The female system is unusual in that it is separated
into two structures: the ovaries and the vitellaria,
often known as the vitelline glands or yolk glands.
 REPRODUCTION
In the tapeworms, the tapelike body is generally divided into a
series of segments, or proglottids, each of which develops a
complete set of male and female genitalia. A rather complex
copulatory apparatus consists of an evertible (capable of turning
outward) penis, or cirrus, in the male and a canal, or vagina, in the
female. Near its opening the female canal may differentiate into a
variety of tubular organs.
Fertilized eggs are often stored in a saclike uterus, which may
become greatly distended; in tapeworms, it may fill a whole
segment.
 REPRODUCTION

Each male and female reproductive

system may have its own external
opening, or gonopore, or the terminal
regions of each system may join to form
a common genital atrium, or passage,
and a genital pore.