Slow developing demersal embryos and larvae of the antarctic sea starOdontaster validus

✍ Scribed by J. S. Pearse

• Publisher: Springer-Verlag
• Year: 1969
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 723 KB
• Volume: 3
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0025-3162
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00353429

✦ Synopsis

The early development of Odonta~er va//dus at Mc~urdo Sound, Aatarctiea, is indireet and includes equal cleavage, a convoluted blastula, a free-swimming coeloblastula, a gastrula, and a feeding bipinnaria larva. Development differs from that of oflaer asteroids in two respects: (1) The developmental rate is extremely slow; blastulae form nearly 2 days after fertilization, gastrulation begins after 7 days, and the bipinnaria develops in about 40 to 55 daym The slow developmental raft appears to be only partly related to the low environmental temperature (-1.5 ~ (2) The embryos and larvae axe largely demersM. Such behavior may be an adaptatgon to keep the larvae out of antarctic surface waters, as does brooding in many other polax e~hinoderms.