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In common with vertebrates, lancelets have a hollow nerve cord running along the back,
pharyngeal slits and a tail that runs past the anus. Also like vertebrates, the muscles are arranged in
blocks called myomeres.
Unlike vertebrates, the dorsal nerve cord is not protected by bone but by a simpler notochord
made up of a cylinder of cells that are closely packed to form a toughened rod. The lancelet notochord,
unlike the vertebrate spine, extends into the head. The nerve cord is only slightly larger in the head
region than in the rest of the body, so that lancelets cannot be said to possess a true brain. Neither do
they have any eyes, or other complex sense organs comparable to those of vertebrates.
Amphioxus also lack tripartite brain (with forebrain, midbrain and hindbrain) protected by a skull,
chambered heart, closed circulatory system and neural crest found on the embryonic neural tube and
are engaged in the formation of the cranium, tooth dentine, some endocrine glands and Schwann
cells, which provide myelin insulation to nerve cells).
References:
Romer, Alfred Sherwood; Parsons, Thomas S. (1977).The Vertebrate Body. Philadelphia, PA: Holt-
Saunders International. pp. 1821. ISBN 0-03-910284-X.