noun
definition
A stage in the development of embryos of most animals consisting of a three-layered sac of ectoderm, mesoderm and endoderm.
Examples of gastrula in a Sentence
If the embryo is set free as a free-swimming, so-called planula-larva, in the blastula, parenchymula, or gastrula stage, then a free actinula stage is not found; if, on the other hand, a free actinula occurs, then there is no free planula stage.
It has usually been regarded as representing both endoderm and mesoderm, and the groove which usually leads to its formation has been compared to the abnormally elongated blastopore of a typical gastrula.
To the primitive two-cell-layered form, the hypothetical ancestor of all Metazoa or Enterozoa, Haeckel gave the name Gastraea; the em- bryonic form which represents in the individual growth from the egg this ancestral condition he called a " gastrula."
The term " diblastula " was subsequently adopted in England for the gastrula of Haeckel.
Thus a planula larva may be a blastula, or but slightly advanced beyond this stage, or it may be (and most usually is) a parenchymula; or in some cases (Scyphomedusae) it may be a gastrula.
After the gastrula stage, which is found as a developmental stage in all Enterozoa, the embryo of the Hydrozoa proceeds to develop characters which are peculiar to the Coelen- a terata only.
In Cordylophora the embryo is set free at the parenchymula stage as a planula which fixes itself and develops into a polyp, both gastrula and actinula stages being suppressed.
The gastrula is formed in this case by invagination.
After the formation of the gastrula by epibole the larva becomes enclosed by an ectodermic test covering the whole of the original surface of the body, including the shell-gland, and leaving only a small opening at the posterior end in which the stomodaeum and proctodaeum are formed.
The orifice of invagination (blastopore) narrows, and we now have a two-cell-layered sac - the gastrula.
The gastrula is in these cases said to be formed by epibole.
B, The Gastrula has become a Trochosphere by the development of the ciliated ring vr (optical section).
The segmentation is complete; one side of the hollow blastosphere invaginates and forms a gastrula.
An interesting feature of the development of Chaetognaths is that, as in some insects, the cells destined to form the reproductive organs are differentiated at a very early period, being apparent even in the gastrula stage.
After invagination is completed, the embryo begins to elongate, the blastopore becomes narrower, and the dorsal wall of the gastrula loses its convexity, and becomes flattened to form the dorsal plate, the outer layer of which is the primordium of the neurochord and the inner layer the primordium of the notochord.
While still within the egg-membrane the epiblastic cells become flagellated, and the gastrula rotates within the membrane.
The gastrula thus formed has a large blastopore, which is at first posterior but afterwards gradually moves towards the anterior end of the ventral surface.
Cleavage leads to the formation of an epibolic gastrula and ciliated embryo which hatches as a free-swimming larva remarkably like that of a Polychaete worm (D).
After the formation of an invaginate gastrula the larval form is rapidly acquired.
The segmentation is peculiar, and leads to the formation of a solid gastrula, consisting of a cortex of ectoderm nuclei surrounding a central endodermal mass, which is exposed at one point - the blastopore.
B, Older gastrula stage, ventral view, showing elongated blastopore and primitive streak.
Abstract. cDNAs specific to vegetal poles of Xenopus gastrula embryos were used as a probe to screen a gastrula embryos were used as a probe to screen a gastrula vegetal pole cDNA library.
Segmentation is complete, a gastrula is formed, the blastopore closes, the archenteron gives off two coelomic sacs which, as far as is known, are unaffected by the super ficial segmentation of the body that divides the larva into three segments.
I, C, al), which soon acquires an opening to the exterior at one pole, and so forms the characteristic embryonic stage of all Enterozoa known as the gastrula (fig.
If the three principal organ-systems of the medusa, namely mouth, tentacles and umbrella, be considered in the light of phylogeny, it is evident that the manubrium bearing the mouth must be the oldest, as representing a common property of all the Coelentera, even of the gastrula embryo of all Enterozoa.
The gastrula has now become an actinula, which may be termed the distinctive larva of the Cnidaria, and doubtless represents in a transitory manner the common ancestor of the group. In no case known, however, does the actinula become the adult, sexually mature individual, but always undergoes further modifications, whereby it develops into either a polyp or a medusa.