PROTOCHORDATES
PROTOCHORDATES
PROTOCHORDATES
A. Phylum: Hemichordata
Characteristics:
1. Pharyngeal clefts usually present
2. Dorsal nerve cord
1. Class: Pterobranchia.
• Mostly sessile, stalked, colonial
• Gather food my muco-ciliary arms (lophophores).
• Few or no pharyngeal slits.
B. Urochordata (Tunicata)
2. Thaliacea.
3.Larvacea.
• Also pelagic and free-swimming throughout life.
C. Cephalochordata (lancelets).
• About 45 species.
• Branchiostoma
• Eel-like, free-swimming, sedentary, burrowing.
• Persistent notochord.
• Epidermis single cell layer.
• Caudal, dorsal, and ventral fins.
• Musculature--myomeres and myosepta (metamerism).
•No highly organized sense organs.
• Almost no cephalization.
• No paired sense organs.
• No vertebral column.
• High number of gill slits.
• Segmented musculature extends to anterior tip of head.
• No paired appendages.
• Outer layer of skin (epidermis) one-cell thick.
• No muscular heart.
• Excretory protonephridia resemble those on non-chordates.
• Protochordates and vertebrates resemble echinoderms and hemichordates because they are deuterostomes. Characteristics of this group
include:
1. Pterobranchs and primitive echinoderms--derived from a hypothesized common ancestor--a sessile arm-feeder.
2. Shift from lophophores to gill-filtering to obtain food.
3. Development of a tadpole-like larva.
4. Neoteny--larval locomotor structures retained throughout life.
1. The exact origin of vertebrates remains unresolved. Members of the group known as protochordates appear to
be close relatives and so are included in the phylum Chordata
Gill Slits: in wall of pharynx (at some point during the life of the animal).
Notochord: also present sometime during life.
Dorsal Hollow Nerve Cord
Postanal Tail
3. Protochordates make up 2 of the 3 chordate subphyla: the Urochordata and Cephalochordata (the remaining one is,
as you might guess, the Craniata).
These animals all share the distinguishing characteristics listed above but lack vertebrae.
4. Urochordata: (meaning the notochord is in the tail) includes the ascidians (sea squirts,tunicates), larvaceans,
and thaliaceans. Larvae are free swimming. Larval ascidians do not feed and swim for only a few days (or less).
Water entering the mouth passes over the gills and out through the atrium. Adhesive papillae attach larvae to
substrate (pilings, rocks, etc.). Following metamorphosis, adults lose notochord, mouth becomes the incurrent
siphon, atriopore becomes the excurrent siphon. Rearrangement of viscera. Food is trapped by mucus in the
endostyle and directed to esophagus. Respiratory water passes over gills and into atrium.
5. Cephalochordata: (meaning the notochord is in the head) includes Amphioxus, a very common marine organism.
Adults are nearly all trunk and tail. Muscles metameric and separated by myosepta. Pharyngeal gill slits open into
the atrium. Filter feeders, but have the ability to swim. Notochord persists throughout life as the primary
supporting structure.
6. Craniata: animals with a vertebral column of bone or cartilage. Nine major extinct or extant classes:
Agnatha - Cyclostomes, 45 species, jawless, poorly developed or absent fins.
Acanthodii - extinct jawed fish
Placodermi - also extinct; bony armor
Chondrichthyes - cartilaginous fish. 575 species. Sharks, rays, and chimeras
Osteichthyes - over 17,000 species. Bony fish
Tetrapods
Amphibia - amphibians, 2,400 species
Reptilia - reptiles. 6,000 living species
Aves - birds, 8,700
Mammalia - mammals. 4,500 species