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Journal of Experimental Biology 46,97-104 (1967)
Published by Company of Biologists 1967

The Respiration of Pteroides Griseum (Bohadsch) a Pennatulid Coelenterate

A. E. BRAFIELD ¹ and G. CHAPMAN ¹

¹ Queen Elizabeth College, University of London

1. The respiration of the pennatulid Pteroides griseum has been investigated by means of a continuous-flow polarographic respirometer and a strip-chart recorder.

2. The rate of oxygen consumption bears the same exponential relation to body weight as in more advanced phyla, and is markedly greater in expanded specimens than in contracted ones.

3. It is suggested that contracted specimens consume oxygen almost exclusively through the ectoderm but that in expanded specimens at least two-thirds of the total oxygen consumed enters through the endoderm.

4. Several sources of evidence confirm that the water within the enteron is poorly oxygenated. Rhythmically fluctuating records of the oxygen concentration of water which has flowed past expanded specimens are the result of periodic expulsions of some of this relatively deoxygenated enteric water.

5. The irrigation of the enteron is very probably brought about by peristaltic waves of contraction which pass along the length of the animal.