Exercise 1

The Chordate Body Plan

Table 1: Amphioxus parts and its functions

Parts Function
gives support to the body and maintain its shape.
Notochord It permits slight bending movement of the body

responsible for a significant number of the body's

myotomes
motor functions
act as sensory devices and as a filter for the water
cirri
passing into the body
Gill slits Functions as a filter feeding device
serves as entrance and storage of food
Oral hood

serves as exit passage of water

atriopore

Metapleural folds help to stabilize the lancelet while swimming

Caudal fin used for propulsion and steering
Dorsal fin stabilize the animal against rolling and to assist in
sudden turns
anus Excretion of waste
Wheel organ draws food through the use of its cilia for
digestion
Ocelli act as simple eyes to detect light
Velar tentacles prevent undesirable objects from entering the
digestive cavity
velum work as valve and filter; surrounds the mouth
atrium Surrounds the pharynx; where water enters
cecum Functions for secretion and absorption

1. What are the generalized features of chordates seen in amphioxus?

In common with vertebrates, lancelets have a hollow nerve cord running along the back,
pharyngeal slits and a tail that runs past the anus. Also like vertebrates, the muscles are arranged in
blocks called myomeres.

2. What are the other charachteristics shared by amphioxus and vertebrates?

 Other similar characteristics include dorsal and ventral aortas and branchial (gill) arches (blood
vessels running over the gills).

3. What makes amphioxus distinct from vertebrates?

Unlike vertebrates, the dorsal nerve cord is not protected by bone but by a simpler notochord
made up of a cylinder of cells that are closely packed to form a toughened rod. The lancelet notochord,
unlike the vertebrate spine, extends into the head. The nerve cord is only slightly larger in the head
region than in the rest of the body, so that lancelets cannot be said to possess a true brain. Neither do
they have any eyes, or other complex sense organs comparable to those of vertebrates.

Amphioxus also lack tripartite brain (with forebrain, midbrain and hindbrain) protected by a skull,
chambered heart, closed circulatory system and neural crest found on the embryonic neural tube and
are engaged in the formation of the cranium, tooth dentine, some endocrine glands and Schwann
cells, which provide myelin insulation to nerve cells).

References:
Romer, Alfred Sherwood; Parsons, Thomas S. (1977).The Vertebrate Body. Philadelphia, PA: Holt-
Saunders International. pp. 1821. ISBN 0-03-910284-X.