Exercise 1 The Chordate Body Plan Table 1: Amphioxus parts and its functions Parts Notochord myotomes cirri

Gill slits Oral hood atriopore Metapleural folds Caudal fin Dorsal fin anus Wheel organ Ocelli Velar tentacles velum atrium cecum Function gives support to the body and maintain its shape. It permits slight bending movement of the body responsible for a significant number of the body's motor functions act as sensory devices and as a filter for the water passing into the body Functions as a filter feeding device serves as entrance and storage of food serves as exit passage of water help to stabilize the lancelet while swimming used for propulsion and steering stabilize the animal against rolling and to assist in sudden turns Excretion of waste draws food through the use of its cilia for digestion act as simple eyes to detect light prevent undesirable objects from entering the digestive cavity work as valve and filter; surrounds the mouth Surrounds the pharynx; where water enters 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: HoltSaunders International. pp. 1821. ISBN 0-03-910284-X.