Animal physiology Flashcards
Three nutritional needs
Fuel for cellular work - conversion of nutrients to energy
Raw materials for biosynthesis - Carbon - Nitrogen
Essential nutrients - items that cannot be biosynthesised
Essential nutrients
AAs - 20 required - all found in meat
Fatty Acids - animals can synthesise most
Vitamins - Required in small amounts
Minerals - inorganic nutrients
Ingestion
4 main methods
Suspension feeders
Fluid feeders
Substrate feeders
Bulk feeders
Digestion
Mechanical and chemical
intracellular digestion
extracellular digestion
Caecum
Pouch that connects where small + large intestine meet
Enlarged in herbivores for cellulose digestion (holds microbiome)
Mutualistic organisms in digestive system
Willow ptarmigan - 2 large caeca for cellulose fermentation
Hoatzin - enlarged muscular crop that houses microbes
Termites - eat wood - house bacteria and protists in hind gut - break down cellulose
Iguana - Has a microbial flora in hindgut
Ruminants
specialised fermentation chamber - called a rumen that houses complex communities of microorganisms
Four chambered stomach
Coprophagy
Ingest soft faeces that are products from the caecum - lagomorphs
Countercurrent flow in fish
Blood flow in opposite direction to water passing over the gills
Bloods is always less saturated with O2 than water O2 always diffuses to blood
negative pressure breathing
pulls air into lungs
exhalation is passive
Mammals
Positive pressure breathing
forcing air in and out of lungs
amphibians
respire across skin
Bellow system
Birds
numerous air sacs
Incoming air does not mix with stale air
every ex and inhalation completely renews the air
Single circulatory system
Fish - blood leaving heart passes through two capillary beds
two chambered heart
blood pressure drops - muscle contractions accelerate circulation
Double
Mammals and birds
Amphibians - 3 chambered heart - pulmocutaneous circuit - picks up O2 through lungs and skin
Osmoconformers
isoosmotic - match osmolarity of environment - passive or aggresive
Most marine inverts
some marine verts - hagfish
crab-eating frog and sharkas/rays - urea retention regulation to remain isoosmotic
Osmoregulation in marine vertebrates
Hypoosmotic to sea water - lose water to environment
Drink large amounts of sea water and excrete excess salt via kidneys and gills - pump out cl- and Na2+ follows passively along electrical gradient
Osmoregulation in freshwater vertebrates
Opposite to marine
Constantly take in water by osmosis - large amounts of dilute urine - drink v little water
Salts lost by diff are replaced in foods and by uptake across gills
Pump in Cl- - Na2+ follws passively
Marine mammals
ingest salt via sea water and food and excrete concentrated urine
highly effective kidneys
Salt excreting nasal glands
marine birds - remove excess NaCl from the blood - fluid secreted is much saltier than sea
Secretory tubules each lined with single layer of transport epithelial cells
actively pump salt from blood into tubules - counter current exchange - enhances salt transfer - results in net gain of water
Osmoregulation in terrestrial animals
drinking water - eating moist foods - metabolic water
Kangaroo rat can survive without drinking
Loses so little water - 90% is replaced by water generated metabolically - extra water comes from seeds
Ostriches have two chambered nasal pasasge that can remove water vapour as the exhale
Nitrogenous wastes
Ammonia - highly toxic - quick excretion - access to water - aquatic animals
Urea - terrestrial animals - liver converts ammonia to urea - expensive - less toxic - stored in high concs in kidney
Uric acid - insects, snails, reptiles, birds - less toxic than ammonia and urea - insoluble in water - more expensive to produce than urea - good for animals with low access to water
Protonephridia
flat worms
network of tubules connect to external openings on animal
smallest branches capped by cellular unit called flame bulb - beating cilia draw in water and solutes - fluid filtrate excreted out via tubules
Malpighian tubules
Insects
Solutes and nitrogenous wastes are secreted into tubules and then passed into the alimentary cana - water follows by osmosis
solutes and most of water reabsorbed by rectum
Relatively dry waste
Antennal glands
located in the head that open near antennae
Consist of a sac - excretory tubule - bladder
Urine formed by filtration and reabsorption
crustaceans