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An unusual structural organization to the gut of a digenetic trematode, Fellodistomum fellis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 April 2009

D. W. Halton
D. W. Halton
Affiliation:
Department of Zoology, The Queen's University, Belfast BT7 1NN
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Summary

An ultrastructural examination of Fellodistomum fellis has revealed that the caecal lining consists of 2 distinct components: (a) cup-shaped digestive cells and (b) a pleomorphic layer of cytoplasm which supports and separates individual digestive cells. The digestive cells sequester host blood components within apical pockets formed by lamellated extensions of the cell surface, and undergo asynchronous, cyclical transformations in morphology associated with extracellular digestion and with the extrusion to the gut lumen of pigmented digestive residues. Histochemical tests and elemental analysis of the pigment suggest that it is a ferripor-phyrin, haematin. In the anterior portion of the caecum the supporting cytoplasmic layer is in continuity with the oesophageal tegument and snares the same ultrastructure. It is concluded that the digestive cells are supported by an extension of the foregut tegument.

Type
Research Article
Information
Parasitology , Volume 85 , Issue 1 , August 1982 , pp. 53 - 60
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1982

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