INTERNAL TRANSPORT

AND CIRCULATORY
SYSTEMS

Dr. Abdul Wahab

 INTERNAL TRANSPORT AND
CIRCULATORY SYSTEMS
• All animals must maintain a homeostatic balance
in their bodies.
• This need requires that nutrients, metabolic
wastes, and respiratory gases must be circulated
through the animal’s body.
• Any system of moving fluids that reduces the
functional diffusion distance that nutrients, wastes,
and gases must traverse is an internal transport or
circulatory system.
• The nature of the system directly relates to the
size, complexity, and lifestyle of the animal in
question.
 Continued….
• Because protozoa are small, with high surface-
area-to-volume ratios, all they need for gas,
nutrient, and waste exchange is simple diffusion.
• In protozoa, the plasma membrane and cytoplasm
are the media through which materials diffuse to
various parts of the organism, or between the
organism and the environment.
• Some invertebrates have evolved specific
transport systems.
• For example, sponges circulate water from the
external environment through their bodies, instead
of circulating an internal fluid.
 Continued….
• Cnidarians, such as Hydra, have a fluid-filled
internal gastrovascular cavity.
• This cavity supplies nutrients for all body cells
lining the cavity, provides oxygen from the water
in the cavity, and is a reservoir for carbon dioxide
and other wastes.
• Simple body movement moves the fluid.
• The gastrovascular cavity of flatworms, such as
the planarian Dugesia, is more complex than that
of Hydra.
• In the planarian, branches penetrate to all parts of
the body.
 Continued….
• Because this branched gastrovascular cavity runs
close to all body cells, diffusion distances for
nutrients, gases, and wastes are short.
• Body movement helps distribute materials to
various parts of the body.
• One disadvantage of this system is that it limits
these animals to relatively small sizes or to
shapes that maintain small diffusion distances.
 Continued….
• Pseudocoelomate invertebrates, such as rotifers,
gastrotrichs, and nematodes, use the coelomic
fluid of their body cavity for transport.
• Most of these animals are small, and movements
of the body against the coelomic fluids, which are
in direct contact with the internal tissues and
organs, produce adequate transport.
• A few other invertebrates e.g., ectoprocts (aquatic
invertebrates, fluid feeder commonly known as
moss animals, sipunculans (unsegmented marine
worms), echinoderms also depend largely on the
body cavity as a coelomic transport chamber.
 Continued….
• Beginning with the molluscs, transport functions
occur with a separate circulatory system.
• A circulatory or cardiovascular system (Gr. kardia,
heart, L. vascular, vessel) is a specialized system
in which a muscular, pumping heart moves the
fluid medium called either hemolymph or blood in
a specific direction determined by the presence of
unidirectional blood vessels.
 Continued….
• The animal kingdom has two basic types of
circulatory systems: open and closed.
• In an open circulatory system, the heart pumps
hemolymph out into the body cavity or at least
through parts of the cavity, where the hemolymph
bathes the cells, tissues, and organs.
• In a closed circulatory system, blood circulates in
the confines of tubular vessels.
• The coelomic fluid of some invertebrates also has
a circulatory role either in concert with, or instead
of, the hemolymph or blood.
 Continued….
• The annelids, such as the earthworm, have a
closed circulatory system in which blood travels
through vessels delivering nutrients to cells and
removing wastes.
• Most molluscs and arthropods have open
circulatory systems in which hemolymph directly
bathes the cells and tissues rather than being
carried only in vessels.
• For example, an insect’s heart pumps hemolymph
through vessels that open into a body cavity
(hemocoel).
 CHARACTERISTICS OF INVERTEBRATE
COELOMIC FLUID
• Some animals (e.g., echinoderms, annelids,
sipunculans) use coelomic fluid as a
supplementary or sole circulatory system.
• Coelomic fluid may be identical in composition to
interstitial fluids or may differ, particularly with
respect to specific proteins and cells. Coelomic
fluid transports gases, nutrients, and waste
products.
• It also may function in certain invertebrates
(annelids) as a hydrostatic skeleton
 Hemolymph
• Hemolymph (Gr. haima, blood, lympha, water) is the
circulating fluid of animals with an open circulatory system.
• Most arthropods, ascidians, and many molluscs have
hemolymph.
• In these animals, a heart pumps hemolymph at low
pressures through vessels to tissue spaces (hemocoel)
and sinuses.
• Generally, the hemolymph volume is high and the
circulation slow.

• In the process of movement, essential gases, nutrients,

and wastes are transported.
 Continued…

• Many times, hemolymph has noncirculatory

functions.
• For example, in insects, hemolymph pressure
assists in molting of the old cuticle and in inflation
of the wings.
• In certain jumping spiders, hydrostatic pressure of
the hemolymph provides a hydraulic mechanism
for limb extension
 Continued…

• The coelomic fluid, hemolymph, or blood of most

animals contains circulating cells called blood
cells or hemocytes.
• Some cells contain a respiratory pigment, such as
hemoglobin, and are called erythrocytes or red
blood cells.
• These cells are usually present in high numbers to
facilitate oxygen transport.
• Cells that do not contain respiratory pigments
have other functions, such as blood clotting.
 BLOOD CELLS
• The number and types of blood cells vary
dramatically in different invertebrates.
• For example, annelid blood contains hemocytes
that are phagocytic.
• The coelomic fluid contains a variety of
coelomocytes (amoebocytes, eleocytes
(containing fat globules), lympocytes, linocytes)
that function in phagocytosis, glycogen storage,
encapsulation, defense responses, and excretion.
 Continued…
• The hemolymph of molluscs has two general
types of hemocytes (amoebocytes and
granulocytes) that have most of the
aforementioned functions as well as nacrezation
(pearl formation) in some bivalves.
• Insect hemolymph contains large numbers of
various hemocyte types that function in
phagocytosis, encapsulation, and clotting.
THANKS