For nearly fifty years the dominant and accepted theory of the evolution of the nervous system has been that of G. H. Parker, developed over the course of the decade from 1909 to 1919 and summarized in his now classic book The Elementary Nervous System.' Like many successful theories, it was an oversimplification of contemporary knowledge presented in a forceful and stimulating manner. In essen...

Mycetophyllia reesi Wells is a colonial scleractinian coral whose outer surface consists of a series of oral-pharyngeal openings that lack tentacles. The polyps also lack a column and cannot protrude from the colonial surface. Correspondingly, there is no central digestive cavity. Instead, the pharynx is directly connected to a series of radially arranged mesenterial ducts lying parallel to the...

Haemodynamic effects of saline-extracted venom from nematocysts isolated from tentacles of the box-jellyfish Chiropsalmus quadrigatus (Habu-kurage) were investigated. In anaesthetized rabbits, i.v. injections of the venom produced hypotension following a transient hypertension. Mean femoral arterial blood flow markedly decreased immediately after the injection and femoral vascular resistance in...

A synthesis of available data on the morphological diversity of polykrikoid dinoflagellates allowed us to formulate a hypothesis of relationships that help explain character evolution within the group. Phylogenetic analyses of new SSU rDNA sequences from Pheopolykrikos beauchampii Chatton, Polykrikos kofoidii Chatton, and Polykrikos lebourae Herdman helped refine this hypothetical framework. Ou...

This article describes ecological and biological differences between two morphs of the Red Sea fire coral Millepora dichotoma. The species is divided into two main morphs: branching and encrusting, which were found to differ both in color and morphology. Each morph has two or more sub-morphs. A total of 372 M. dichotoma colonies were examined in a census at two study sites in the Gulf of Elat. ...

The smallest known collagens with only 14 Gly-X-Y repeats referred to as minicollagens are the main constituents of the capsule wall of nematocysts. These are explosive organelles found in Hydra, jellyfish, corals and other Cnidaria. Minicollagen-1 of Hydra recombinantly expressed in mammalian 293 cells contains disulfide bonds within its N- and C-terminal Cys-rich domains but no interchain cro...

Stoichactis helianthus toxin, a protein derived presumably from the nematocysts, was purified to homogeneity. It has a molecular weight of about 16,000, an isoelectric pH of 9.8, and it contains approximately 3.7% carbohydrate. It is powerfully hemolytic for erythrocytes derived from a variety of animal species, those of the cat being the most sensitive and those of the guinea pig the most resi...

Hair bundles on tentacles of sea anemones are similar to vertebrate hair bundles in terms of structure and function. Anemone hair bundles are involved in regulating discharge of nematocysts, "stinging capsules," used to capture prey. N-acetylated sugars from the prey including N-acetylneuraminic acid (NANA) induce hair bundles to elongate while shifting vibration dependent discharge of nematocy...

2.1.1 Taxonomy and morphology of scleractinian corals Stony corals are marine invertebrates in the phylum Cnidaria (Coelenterata) that secrete a calcium carbonate skeleton. Cnidaria is the only phylum that is diploblastic (i.e., two-tissue layers); all higher taxa are triploblastic (three-tissue layers) and thus contain a true mesoderm. The phylum is named Cnidaria because organisms use cnidae ...