scholarly journals Adaptation to Changes of Salinity in the Polychaetes

1937 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-70
Author(s):  
L. C. BEADLE

1. Nereis diversicolor collected from the same locality at different times showed smaller weight increases in dilute sea water (25 per cent) during the winter than during the summer months. 2. In spite of great variations in the weight curve, the body fluid concentration curve was very constant. 3. The maintenance of hypertonic body fluids and the regulation of body volume are largely unconnected. 4. The lowering of the weight curve below that theoretically expected from the concentration curve cannot be attributed to passive salt loss through the body surface. It is suggested that this is due to the removal of fluid through the nephridia under the hydrostatic pressure produced by the contraction of the body wall muscles. 5. Animals previously subjected to dilute sea water, when placed in water isotonic with the body fluids, will increase the concentration of the latter. This result is more marked when the internal hydrostatic pressure is high. 6. The results suggest that the osmotic regulatory mechanism involves the removal by the nephridia of fluid hypotonic to the body fluids. But no direct evidence for this is available. 7. Calcium deficiency and cyanide in dilute sea water cause an increase of weight and ultimately inhibit the maintenance of hypertonic body fluids. Both these effects are reversible. 8. The mechanism by which body fluids are maintained hypertonic to the external medium is not sufficiently developed to be of survival value in the locality in which the animals were found. 9. The control of body volume is probably of greater importance. 10. The majority of the extra oxygen consumption in dilute sea water is not the result of osmotic work. It is suggested that it may be due to work done by the body wall muscles in resisting swelling.

1954 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 402-423
Author(s):  
WARREN J. GROSS

1. The sipunculid Dendrostomum zostericolum demonstrates no ability to regulate osmotically. 2. Dendrostomum behaves superficially as an osmometer, but is actually more complex: (a) the worm shows volume control in concentrated and dilute sea water; (b) it is permeable to salts, mostly through the gut and/or nephridiopores; (c) it can release osmotically active particles from its body wall to the blood. 3. The body wall of Dendrostomum is highly permeable to water, but only slightly to salts. Permeability for both salts and water is greater inwards than outward. 4. Dendrostomum can tolerate a loss of 36% body weight by desiccation and recover when returned to sea water. The mechanism of this tolerance appears to be the removal by fixation in the tissues, of osmotically active particles from the body fluids.


1960 ◽  
Vol s3-101 (54) ◽  
pp. 149-176
Author(s):  
R. B. CLARK ◽  
M. E. CLARK

Nephtys lacks circular body-wall muscles. The chief antagonists of the longitudinal muscles are the dorso-ventral muscles of the intersegmental body-wall. The worm is restrained from widening when either set of muscles contracts by the combined influence of the ligaments, some of the extrinsic parapodial muscles, and possibly, to a limited extent, by the septal muscles. Although the septa are incomplete, they can and do form a barrier to the transmission of coelomic fluid from one segment to the next under certain conditions, particularly during eversion of the proboscis. Swimming is by undulatory movements of the body but the distal part of the parapodia execute a power-stroke produced chiefly by the contraction of the acicular muscles. It is suspected that the extrinsic parapodial muscles, all of which are inserted in the proximal half of the parapodium, serve to anchor the parapodial wall at the insertion of the acicular muscles and help to provide a rigid point of insertion for them. Burrowing is a cyclical process involving the violent eversion of the proboscis which makes a cavity in the sand. The worm is prevented from slipping backwards by the grip the widest segments have on the sides of the burrow. The proboscis is retracted and the worm crawls forward into the cavity it has made. The cycle is then repeated. Nephtys possesses a unique system of elastic ligaments of unusual structure. The anatomy of the system is described. The function of the ligaments appears to be to restrain the body-wall and parapodia from unnecessary and disadvantageous dilatations during changes of body-shape, and to serve as shock-absorbers against the high, transient, fluid pressures in the coelom, which are thought to accompany the impact of the proboscis against the sand when the worm is burrowing. From what is known of its habits, Nephtys is likely to undertake more burrowing than most other polychaetes.


1976 ◽  
Vol 65 (1) ◽  
pp. 131-145 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. D. Stevens ◽  
A. M. Sutterlin

1. The ability of fish gills to transfer heat was measured by applying a heat pulse to blood in the ventral aorta and measuring it before and after passing through the gills of a teleost, Hemitripterus americanus. 2. 80–90% of heat contained in the blood is lost during passage through the gills. 3. The fraction of heat not lost during passage through the gills is due to direct transfer of heat between the afferent and efferent artery within the gill bar. 4. The major fraction of metabolic heat (70 - 90%) is lost through the body wall and fins of the sea raven in sea water at 5 degrees C; the remainder is lost through the gills.


1979 ◽  
Vol 82 (1) ◽  
pp. 273-280
Author(s):  
B. S. WONG ◽  
DONALD M. MILLER ◽  
T. T. DUNAGAN

Body wall muscles of an acanthocephalan Macracanthorhynchus hirudinaceus were studied by means of scanning and light microscopy and intracellular recording of potentials. Three types of spontaneous potential changes were found: larger (L) potentials which usually exhibited overshoot and were as large as 65 mV; smaller symmetric (A) potentials approximately 15 mV in amplitude; and even smaller asymmetric (S) potentials which sometimes reached 10 mV. The potentials recorded depended upon the position of the electrode in the anterior-posterior, as well as the medialateral, axis. Tetrodotoxin eliminated L but not S potentials. Ouabain lengthened the time for depolarization of L potentials and depolarized the membrane potentials. It is suggested that the rete system activates the body wall muscles in Acanthocephala.


Development ◽  
1991 ◽  
Vol 111 (3) ◽  
pp. 667-681 ◽  
Author(s):  
P.Y. Goh ◽  
T. Bogaert

As part of a general study of genes specifying a pattern of muscle attachments, we identified and genetically characterised mutants in the mup-1 gene. The body wall muscles of early stage mup-1 embryos have a wild-type myofilament pattern but may extend ectopic processes. Later in embryogenesis, some body wall muscles detach from the hypodermis. Genetic analysis suggests that mup-1 has both a maternal and a zygotic component and is not required for postembryonic muscle growth and attachment. mup-1 mutants are suppressed by mutations in several genes that encode extracellular matrix components. We propose that mup-1 may encode a cell surface/extracellular matrix molecule required both for the positioning of body wall muscle attachments in early embryogenesis and the subsequent maintenance of these attachments to the hypodermis until after cuticle synthesis.


1991 ◽  
Vol 158 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. I. Syed ◽  
W. Winlow

1. The morphology and electrophysiology of a newly identified bilateral pair of interneurones in the central nervous system of the pulmonate pond snail Lymnaea stagnalis is described. 2. These interneurones, identified as left and right pedal dorsal 11 (L/RPeD11), are electrically coupled to each other as well as to a large number of foot and body wall motoneurones, forming a fast-acting neural network which coordinates the activities of foot and body wall muscles. 3. The left and right sides of the body wall of Lymnaea are innervated by left and right cerebral A cluster neurones. Although these motoneurones have only ipsilateral projections, they are indirectly electrically coupled to their contralateral homologues via their connections with L/RPeD11. Similarly, the activities of left and right pedal G cluster neurones, which are known to be involved in locomotion, are also coordinated by L/RPeD11. 4. Selective ablation of both neurones PeD11 results in the loss of coordination between the bilateral cerebral A clusters. 5. Interneurones L/RPeD11 are multifunctional. In addition to coordinating motoneuronal activity, they make chemical excitatory connections with heart motoneurones. They also synapse upon respiratory motoneurones, hyperpolarizing those involved in pneumostome opening (expiration) and depolarizing those involved in pneumostome closure (inspiration). 6. An identified respiratory interneurone involved in pneumostome closure (visceral dorsal 4) inhibits L/RPeD11 together with all their electrically coupled follower cells. 7. Both L/RPeD11 have strong excitatory effects on another pair of electrically coupled neurones, visceral dorsal 1 and right parietal dorsal 2, which have previously been shown to be sensitive to changes in the partial pressure of environmental oxygen (PO2). 8. Although L/RPeD11 participate in whole-body withdrawal responses, electrical stimulation applied directly to these neurones was not sufficient to induce this behaviour.


2011 ◽  
Vol 7 (6) ◽  
pp. 885-888 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shannon P. Gerry ◽  
David J. Ellerby

The body wall muscles of sanguivorous leeches power mechanically diverse behaviours: suction feeding, crawling and swimming. These require longitudinal muscle to exert force over an extremely large length range, from 145 to 46 per cent of the mean segmental swimming length. Previous data, however, suggest that leech body wall muscle has limited capacity for force production when elongated. Serotonin (5-HT) alters the passive properties of the body wall and stimulates feeding. We hypothesized that 5-HT may also have a role in allowing force production in elongated muscle by changing the shape of the length–tension relationship (LTR). LTRs were measured from longitudinal muscle strips in vitro in physiological saline with and without the presence of 10 µM 5-HT. The LTR was much broader than previously measured for leech muscle. Rather than shifting the LTR, 5-HT reduced passive muscle tonus and increased active stress at all lengths. In addition to modulating leech behaviour and passive mechanical properties, 5-HT probably enhances muscle force and work production during locomotion and feeding.


1936 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 309-328
Author(s):  
L. E. R. PICKEN

1. In Carcinus maenas: (a) The blood may be hypertonic, isotonic or hypotonic to the external medium. (b) The urine may be hypertonic, isotonic or hypotonic to the blood, and its concentration may differ in the two antennary glands. (c) The hydrostatic pressure of the body fluid is c. 13 cm. of water. (d) The colloid osmotic pressure of the blood is c. 11 cm. of water. (e) The urine probably contains protein and has a colloid osmotic pressure of c. 3 cm. of water. 2. In Potamobius fluviatilis: (a) The blood is hypertonic to the external medium. (b) The urine is hypotonic to the blood but hypertonic to the external medium and its concentration may differ in the two antennary glands. (c) The hydrostatic pressure of the body fluid is c. 20 cm. of water. (d) The colloid osmotic pressure of the blood is c. 15 cm. of water. (e) The urine may contain protein and has a colloid osmotic pressure (calculated) of c. 2 cm. of water. 3. In Peripatopsis spp.: (a) The blood is hypertonic to the urine. (b) The hydrostatic pressure of the body fluid is c. 10 cm. of water. (c) The colloid osmotic pressure (calculated) of the blood is c. 5 cm. of water. (d) The urine may contain protein and has a colloid osmotic pressure (calculated) of c. 2.5 cm. of water. 4. It is concluded that filtration is possible and that secretion and resorption almost certainly occur in the formation of the urine. 5. A microthermopile is described. 6. Methods are described for measuring the hydrostatic pressure and the colloid osmotic pressures of the body fluids in small animals.


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