Animal Diversity

Animal are multi-cellular, heterotrophic eukaryotes with tissues that develop from embryonic layers

Construction a definition of an animal is not straightforward, because there are exceptions to nearly every criterion for distinguishing animals from other lifeforms
However, several characteristics, taken together, sufficiently define the group:
Nutrition Cell structure and specialization Reproduction and development

Nutritional Mode
Animals differ from plants and fungi in their mode of nutrition. Animals are heterotrophs that ingest their food then use enzyme to digest it within the body
All animals, some fungi and most bacteria are heterotrophs Fungi are heterotrophs too but grow on or near their food and feed by absorption (release enzyme to digest food outside their bodies) Plants are autotrophic eukaryotes capable of generating organic molecules through photosynthesis (producer)

Cell Structure and Specialization

Animals are multicellular eukaryotes Their cells lack the structural support of cell walls seen in plants and fungi Animal cells are held together by structural proteins such as collagen (which is found only in animals) Nervous tissue and muscle tissue are unique to animals

Reproduction and Development

Most animals reproduce sexually, with the diploid stage usually dominating the life cycle After a sperm fertilizes an egg, the zygote undergoes rapid cell division called cleavage

Cleavage leads to formation of a blastula

The blastula undergoes gastrulation, forming a gastrula with different layers of embryonic tissues that will develop into adult body parts

Zygot undergoes series of mitotic divisions called clevage

Cleavage

Zygote

Eight-cell stage

Cleavage results in formation of multi-cellular stage blastula which is a hollow ball of cells that surround a cavity called blastocoel

Cleavage

Cleavage Blastula

Zygote

Eight-cell stage Blastocoel Cross section of blastula

Gastrulation: one end of the embryo folds inward, expand and eventually Fills the blastocoel, producing layers of embryonic tissues Ectoderm (outer layer) and Endoderm (inner layer)

Blastocoel Cleavage Cleavage Blastula Endoderm Ectoderm Zygote Eight-cell stage Cross section of blastula Gastrulation Blastocoel Archenteron

Gastrula Blastopore

Some animals, including humans, develop directly into adults through Stages of maturation; however many animals have at least one larval stage A larva is sexually immature and morphologically distinct from the adult; it eventually undergoes metamorphosis

Adult animals vary widely in morphology, nevertheless the genetic network that controls animal development is similar across broad range of animals All animals, and only animals, have Hox genes that regulate the development of body form

Hox : genes that contain a common DNA sequence known as homeoboxes sequence
Although the Hox family of genes has been highly conserved, it can produce a wide diversity of animal morphology

The history of animals spans more than half a billion years The animal kingdom includes a great diversity of living species and an even greater diversity of extinct ones The common ancestor of living animals may have lived between 675 and 875 million years ago This ancestor may have resembled modern choanoflagellates, protists that are the closest living relatives of animals

Individual choanoflagellate Choanoflagellates

OTHER EUKARYOTES Animals

Sponges

Collar cell (choanocyte)

Other animals

Early members of the animal fossil record dates from 565 to 550 million years ago

Animals can be characterized by Body Plans A set of morphological and developmental traits integrated into a functional whole living animal.

Symmetry Animals can be categorized according to the symmetry of their bodies, radial symmetry bilateral symmetry Tissues organization ectoderm; endoderm, and mesoderm Body cavities (coelom) A fluid or air filled space separating the digestive tract from the outer body wall. (true coelom forms from tissue derived from mesoderm)

Functions of body cavity (Coelom):

1) its fluid cushion the suspended organs help preventing internal injury
2) in some animals, e.g. earthworm, contain non-compressible fluid against which muscle can work 3) allow internal organs to grow and move independently of outer body wall otherwise every beat of the heart or ripple of intestine would warp the body surface

Coelom

Body covering (from ectoderm) Tissue layer lining coelom and suspending internal organs (from mesoderm)

Digestive tract (from endoderm)

(a) Coelomate (has True coelom e.g. earthworms) Body covering (from ectoderm) Pseudocoelom Muscle layer (from mesoderm)

Digestive tract (from endoderm)

(b) Pseudocoelomate (lining tissue is from mesoderm and endoderm e.g. roundworms)

Body covering (from ectoderm)

Tissuefilled region (from mesoderm)

Wall of digestive cavity (from endoderm) (c) Acoelomate, (Lack body cavity, no coelom(e.g. planarians-flatworms)

Coelom
Body covering (from ectoderm) Tissue layer lining coelom and suspending internal organs (from mesoderm)

Digestive tract (from endoderm)

(a) Coelomate

Body covering (from ectoderm)

Tissuefilled region (from mesoderm)

Wall of digestive cavity (from endoderm) (c) Acoelomate

Triploblastic animals that lack a body cavity are called acoelomates Example: planarians (non-parasitic, fresh water flat worm)

Type of Cleavage Cleavage: is the repeated division (rapid cell cycle with no significant growth) of a fertilized ovum, producing a cluster of cells with the same size as the original zygote; the cleavage end with the formation of blastula a) Determinate cleavageeach cell produced by early embryonic cleavage does not have the capacity to develop into a complete embryo b) Indeterminate cleavage when the original cell in divides, the two resulting cells can be separated, and each one can individually develop into a whole organism

Human embryos undergoing cleavage in vitro

Annelids e.g. earthworms

PHYLOGENY: the evolutionary history of an organism

Phyle i.e. Genetikos i.e.

tribe relative to birth

Phylogenetic tree or evolutionary tree is a branching diagram or tree showing the inferred evolutionary relationships among various biological species or other entities based upon similarities and differences in their physical and/or genetic characteristics

Animal phylogeny based on Morphological and developmental comparison

Animal phylogeny based on molecular data

New views of animal phylogeny are emerging from molecular data

Zoologists recognize about three dozen animal phyla Current debate in animal systematics has led to the development of two phylogenetic hypotheses, but others exist as well

 One hypothesis of animal phylogeny is based mainly on morphological and developmental comparisons
One hypothesis of animal phylogeny is based mainly on molecular data

Points of Agreement
morphological and molecular agree on a number of major features of animal phylogeny

All animals share a common ancestor Sponges are basal animals

Eumetazoa is a clade of animals (eumetazoans) with true tissues

Most animal phyla belong to the clade Bilateria, and are called bilaterians Chordates and some other phyla belong to the clade Deuterostomia

Main Point of differences of the two phylogenetic trees

The morphology-based phylogenetic tree divides bilaterians into two clades: deuterostomia and protostomia
While the molecular phylogenetic tree (based on ribosomal genes, Hox genes, and dozens of other protein coding nuclear genes ) indicate three bilaterian clades: Deuterostomia, Ecdysozoa, Lophotrochozoa

Ecdysozoans shed their exoskeletons through a process called ecdysis. The animal will secrete a new larger exoskeleton

Lophotrochozoa refers to two different features observed in some animals belonging to this clade

These two feature are: lophophore

a crown of ciliated tentacles that function in feeding

trochophore larva a distinctive developmental stage of members of certain phyla

Early cleavage patterns vary widely between different groups of animals, based largely on the orientation of the division planes. The simplest pattern is radial cleavage, in which successful division planes are at 90 degree angles relative to each other. This results in the blastomeres (the group of cell comprising blastula) aligned directly over or to the side of one another. In spiral cleavage, the division planes are not at 90 degree angles, resulting in blastomeres that are NOT aligned directly over or beside one another.

Symmetry Is the correspondence in size, form, and arrangement of parts on opposite sides of a plane, line, or point

You should now be able to:

1. List the characteristics that combine to define animals

2.

Distinguish between the following pairs or sets of terms: radial and bilateral symmetry; diploblastic and triploblastic; spiral and radial cleavage; determinate and indeterminate cleavage; acoelomate, pseudocoelomate
Compare the developmental differences between protostomes and deuterostomes Compare the alternate relationships of annelids and arthropods presented by two different proposed phylogenetic trees

3.

4.

5.

Distinguish between ecdysozoans and lophotrochozoans

Invertebrates
Invertebrates are animals that lack a backbone They account for 95% of known animal species what is the number of the known animal species? so 95% of this number are invertebrates!

A jelly

A roundworm

A sponge

Acoel flatworms

annelid

An octopus A scorpion (an arachnid) comb jelly

Review of animal phylogeny. Except for sponges and a few other groups, all animals have tissues and are in the clade Eumetazoa. Most animals are in the diverse clade Bilateria

Lophotrochozoans, a clade which was identified by molecular data, have the widest range of animal body forms
Bilaterian animals have bilateral symmetry and triploblastic development The clade Bilateria contains Lophotrochozoa, Ecdysozoa, and Deuterostomia

Some member of the lophotrochzoa develop a lophophore for feeding,

others pass through a trochophore larval stage, and a few have neither feature

Lophotrochozoa includes the following phyla:

Flatworms*, rotifers*, ectoprocts, brachiopods, molluscs, and annelids*

Flatworms
Members of phylum Platyhelminthes live in marine, freshwater, and damp terrestrial habitats Although flatworms undergo triploblastic development, they are acoelomates (?) [i.e. having no coelom or cavity] They are flattened dorsoventrally and have a gastrovascular cavity Gas exchange and elimination of waste (ammonia) takes place by diffusion across the surface, and protonephridia regulate the osmotic balance Protonephridia a network of tubules with ciliated cells pull fluid through branched duct to the outside

 Flatworms are divided into four classes:

Turbellaria (mostly free-living flatworms) Monogenea (monogeneans) Trematoda (trematodes, or flukes) Cestoda (tapeworms)

Turbellarians
Turbellarians are nearly all free-living and mostly marine The best-known turbellarians are commonly called planarians

Planarians are hermaphrodites, having both male and female reproductive organs

Monogeneans and Trematodes

Monogeneans and trematodes live as parasites in or on other animals They parasitize a wide range of hosts, and most have complex life cycles with alternating sexual and asexual stages Most monogeneans are external parasites of fish Trematodes that parasitize humans spend part of their lives in snail hosts (an intermediate host)
can stay in human host for more than 40 years as they camouflage themselves by mimicking the surface protein of their hosts

The illness known as Schistosomiasis or bilharzias

Tapeworms (class cestoda)

Tapeworms are parasites of vertebrates and lack a digestive system Tapeworms absorb nutrients from the hosts intestine. Absorption occurs through tapeworms body surface Fertilized eggs, produced by sexual reproduction, leave the hosts body in feces

Infected feces food & water of intermediate host (pigs, cattle) egg develop into larvae cyst in muscles of animal hosts human consumption of infected meat worms develop into mature adults Nutritional deficiencies