Flatworm

  • Platyhelminthes.
  • unsegmented, soft-bodied
  • no specialized circulatory and respiratory organs, which restricts them to having flattened shapes that allow oxygen and nutrients to pass through their bodies by diffusion.
    • need to keep the concentration of dissolved substances in their body fluids at a fairly constant level.
  • no internal body cavity, so are described as acoelomates.
  • Mostly - The digestive cavity has only one opening for both ingestion (intake of nutrients) and egestion (removal of undigested wastes); as a result, the food cannot be processed continuously.
    • some long species have an anus and some with complex, branched guts have more than one anus
  • The space between the skin and gut is filled with mesenchyme, also known as parenchyma, a connective tissue made of cells and reinforced by collagen fibers that act as a type of skeleton, providing attachment points for muscles.
  • Free-living flatworms are mostly predators, and live in water or in shaded, humid terrestrial environments, such as leaf litter.

Tapeworms

  • Cestodes

Flukes

  • Trematoda

Monogenea

  • external parasites infesting aquatic animals, and their larvae metamorphose into the adult form after attaching to a suitable host.

Planaria

Planaria have much of what we have: eyes; auricles have mechano/chemo -sensors: like both nose & ears, a mouth, brain, sex; their circulatory & digestive system are sort of united. But if you cut their brain off they can regenerate one & apparently still retain their old memories. - MT