Abstract
Cubomedusae, or box jellyfish, are renowned for their immense stinging
power, but another truly remarkable feature is their visual system. They
have four sensory structures called rhopalia, and each of the rhopalia contains
six eyes of four morphological types. These eyes support a range of
behaviors in the box jellyfish such as obstacle avoidance and navigation.
The need to process the visual information and turn it into the appropriate
behavior puts strong demands on the nervous system of box jellyfish,
which appears more elaborate than in other cnidarians. Here, the central
part of this nervous system is described. Each rhopalium holds a separate
part of the CNS with 1,000 nerve cells and a large amount of neuropil.
The rhopalial nervous system has several subsystems defined by the anatomy,
location, and immunocytochemistry of the cells. Most of the subsystems
connect to one or more of the eye types, and it is likely that the rhopalial
nervous system accounts for most of the visual processing. The
major part of the CNS is made up of a ring nerve encircling the bell
shaped body. The ring nerve holds around 10,000 cells and is directly
connected to all four rhopalial nervous systems. The main function of the
ring nerve is probably to integrate the information from the rhopalia and
control the motor nerve net. Both parts of the CNS contain subsystems of
giant neurons indicating the need for fast conduction. Uni- as well as
bidirectional synapses are found throughout the CNS.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Journal | Journal of Morphology |
| Issue number | 12 |
| Pages (from-to) | 1463 |
| Number of pages | 1 |
| ISSN | 0362-2525 |
| Publication status | Published - 2008 |
| Event | 1st International Congress on Invertebrate Morphology - , Denmark Duration: 17 Aug 2008 → 21 Aug 2008 |
Conference
| Conference | 1st International Congress on Invertebrate Morphology |
|---|---|
| Country/Territory | Denmark |
| Period | 17/08/2008 → 21/08/2008 |