Context: Researchers recently described a 500-million-year-old fossil species of tunicate, suggesting that the modern tunicate body plan had already established itself shortly after the Cambrian Explosion.
What’s Tunicate?
- Tunicates, also known as sea squirts, are marine animals that typically attach themselves to surfaces such as docks, rocks, or boat undersides.
- They may appear as small, colored blobs to most observers.
- Contrary to expectations, tunicates are more closely related to vertebrates (including humans) than to many other invertebrate species.
- There are two main tunicate lineages namely;
- Ascidiaceans: Sea squirts, commonly referred to as such, start their lives as mobile tadpoles and undergo metamorphosis into barrel-shaped adults with two siphons. They live their adult life attached to the seafloor.
- Appendicularias: They retain the look of a tadpole as they grow to adults and swim freely in the upper waters. These seem extremely far removed from vertebrates.
Features
- Tunicates are truly strange creatures that come in all shapes and sizes and have a wide variety of lifestyles.
- An adult tunicate’s basic shape is typically barrel-like, with two siphons projecting from its body.
- One of the siphons draws in water with food particles through suction, allowing the animal to feed using an internal basket-like filter device.
- The other siphon expels the water.
FAQs Related with Tunicates
Ques 1: What are tunicates?
Answer: Tunicates, also known as sea squirts, are marine animals that belong to the phylum Chordata, which includes vertebrates like mammals, fish, and birds.
Ques 2: How do tunicates differ from other invertebrate animals?
Answer: Tunicates are unique among invertebrates because they are more closely related to vertebrates than to most other invertebrate groups. They share certain anatomical and developmental characteristics with vertebrates.
Ques 3: Where can tunicates be found and how do they live?
Answer: Tunicates attach themselves to surfaces like rocks, docks, or boat hulls in marine environments.They filter-feed by drawing water through their bodies to extract nutrients and oxygen, and they often form colonies or clusters.
Read Also : Atlantic Menhaden: Species In News
