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Echinoderms
What is an Echinoderm?
Echinoderms are characterized by spiny skin, an internal skeleton, a water vascular system, and suction-cuplike structures called Tube Feet
Most echinoderms exhibit a five-part radial symmetry
Anatomy of Echinoderms
The Water Vascular System
The Water Vascular System (continued)
The water Vascular System, which is filled with fluid, carries out many essential body functions in echinoderms
Among these functions are respiration, circulation, and movement
The Madreporite is the opening to the outside
Tube Feet
A Tube Foot is a structure that operates like suction cups. Think of an Octopus, or the end of a rubber dart on a toy gun. Now, multiply that by hundreds of times to get an idea of how many a Sea Star has
Feeding
Sea Stars are carnivorous. They wrap around bivalve animals like clams or mussels, use their tube feet to break them open, and push their own stomach out into the shell to break the clam down with its stomach enzymes
Feeding (continued)
Other animals, like this Feather Star, are filter feeders
Feather Stars stretch their tube feet and hope to catch as much plankton as they can from the sea
Feeding (continued)
Sea Cucumbers act like the vacuum cleaners of the sea. They crawl around and eat all the algae and debris from the ocean floor
Sea Urchins scrape rocks and the sea floor with their needles and eat all the algae they can find
Respiration and Circulation
Oxygen, food processing, and waste are carried out by the Water Vascular System
Sea Stars also use their Tube Feet to excrete gas and oxygen while other species use skin gills to breathe
Reproduction
Echinoderms reproduce by external fertilization
Both types of gametes are excreted into the open water where fertilization occurs
Larvae can freely swim around before settling into the sea floor to mature into adults
Nervous System
Echinoderms lack a complex Nervous System
Echinoderms lack a brain, but they make up for it in a simple system of scattered nerve cells around their body which can sense light, gravity, and chemicals released by potential prey
Types of Echinoderms
Sea Stars are the most common Echinoderms and perhaps the most famous
They are slow-moving and have rough skin
If torn into pieces, each piece can regenerate as long as a piece of the central part of their body is intact
Types of Echinoderms (continued)
Like a Sea Star, only faster. Brittle Stars have longer and slender arms compared to Sea Stars
Like a lizard who can shed its tail to distract a predator, Brittle Stars can shed an arm or two to escape their predators
Types of Echinoderms (continued)
Sea Urchins and Sand Dollars are detritivores (underwater grazers) who eat algae
Sea Urchins defend themselves by using their sharp needles, and Sand Dollars can burrow under sand and mud to escape their predators
Types of Echinoderms (continued)
Sea Cucumbers are little underwater vacuum cleaners
They are essential to the ecosystem since they eat all debris and organic matter from the sea floor. Without them, swimming at sea would be like swimming in an unclean fish tank
Types of Echinoderms (continued)
Feather Stars and Sea Lilies are among the world’s oldest living creatures
They look like little Palm Trees stretching up to the sea and collect plankton with their tube feet
Echinoderms in Popular Media
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