Blastopore formation
The blastopore forms the anus of the alimentary system in the juvenile and adult forms.
The archenteron develops into the alimentary canal, and a mouth opening is formed by invagination of ectoderm at the pole opposite the blastopore of the gastrula. The resulting coelom is termed an enterocoelom. This happens when the mesodermal pouches become separated from the invaginating endodermal layer forming the archenteron, then expand and fuse to form the coelomic cavity. In deuterostomes, the endodermal lining of the archenteron usually forms buds called coelomic pouches that expand and ultimately obliterate the embryonic blastocoel (the cavity within the blastula and early gastrula) to become the embryonic mesoderm, the third germ layer.
#Blastopore formation series#
There are a series of other developmental characteristics that differ between protostomes and deuterostomes, including the type of early cleavage (embryonic cell division) and the mode of formation of the coelom of the embryo: Protosomes typically exhibit spiral mosaic cleavage whereas deuterostomes exhibit radial regulative cleavage. In protostomes (“mouth first”), the first embryonic opening becomes the mouth, and the second opening becomes the anus.
The word deuterostome comes from the Greek word meaning “mouth second,” indicating that the mouth develops as a secondary structure opposite the location of the blastopore, which becomes the anus. Recall that protostomes and deuterostomes differ in certain aspects of their embryonic development, and they are named based on which opening of the archenteron (primitive gut tube) develops first. The phyla Echinodermata and Chordata (the phylum that includes humans) both belong to the superphylum Deuterostomia.