Amphibians

Jai Ganesh · 2024-03-19 17:04:23

Amphibians

Gist

Amphibians are cold-blooded vertebrates (vertebrates have backbones) that don’t have scales. They live part of their lives in water and part on land.

Summary

Amphibian is (class Amphibia), any member of the group of vertebrate animals characterized by their ability to exploit both aquatic and terrestrial habitats. The name amphibian, derived from the Greek amphibios meaning “living a double life,” reflects this dual life strategy—though some species are permanent land dwellers, while other species have a completely aquatic mode of existence.

Approximately 8,100 species of living amphibians are known. First appearing about 340 million years ago during the Middle Mississippian Epoch, they were one of the earliest groups to diverge from ancestral fish-tetrapod stock during the evolution of animals from strictly aquatic forms to terrestrial types. Today amphibians are represented by frogs and toads (order Anura), newts and salamanders (order Caudata), and caecilians (order Gymnophiona). These three orders of living amphibians are thought to derive from a single radiation of ancient amphibians, and although strikingly different in body form, they are probably the closest relatives to one another. As a group, the three orders make up subclass Lissamphibia. Neither the lissamphibians nor any of the extinct groups of amphibians were the ancestors of the group of tetrapods that gave rise to reptiles. Though some aspects of the biology and anatomy of the various amphibian groups might demonstrate features possessed by reptilian ancestors, amphibians are not the intermediate step in the evolution of reptiles from fishes.

Modern amphibians are united by several unique traits. They typically have a moist skin and rely heavily on cutaneous (skin-surface) respiration. They possess a double-channeled hearing system, green rods in their retinas to discriminate hues, and pedicellate (two-part) teeth. Some of these traits may have also existed in extinct groups.

Members of the three extant orders differ markedly in their structural appearance. Frogs and toads are tailless and somewhat squat with long, powerful hind limbs modified for leaping. In contrast, caecilians are limbless, wormlike, and highly adapted for a burrowing existence. Salamanders and newts have tails and two pairs of limbs of roughly the same size; however, they are somewhat less specialized in body form than the other two orders.

Many amphibians are obligate breeders in standing water. Eggs are laid in water, and the developing larvae are essentially free-living embryos; they must find their own food, escape predators, and perform other life functions while they continue to develop. As the larvae complete their embryonic development, they adopt an adult body plan that allows them to leave aquatic habitats for terrestrial ones. Even though this metamorphosis from aquatic to terrestrial life occurs in members of all three amphibian groups, there are many variants, and some taxa bear their young alive. Indeed, the roughly 8,100 living species of amphibians display more evolutionary experiments in reproductive mode than any other vertebrate group. Some taxa have aquatic eggs and larvae, whereas others embed their eggs in the skin on the back of the female; these eggs hatch as tadpoles or miniature frogs. In other groups, the young develop within the oviduct, with the embryos feeding on the wall of the oviduct. In some species, eggs develop within the female’s stomach.

Details

Amphibians are ectothermic, anamniotic, four-limbed vertebrate animals that constitute the class Amphibia. In its broad sense, it is paraphyletic group encompassing all tetrapods excluding the amniotes (tetrapods with an amniotic membrane, such as modern reptiles, birds, and mammals). All extant (living) amphibians belong to the monophyletic subclass Lissamphibia, with three living orders: Anura (frogs), Urodela (salamanders), and Gymnophiona (caecilians). Evolved to be mostly semiaquatic, amphibians have adapted to inhabit a wide variety of habitats, with most species living in freshwater, wetland or terrestrial ecosystems (such as riparian woodland, fossorial and even arboreal habitats). Their life cycle typically starts out as aquatic larvae with gills known as tadpoles, but some species have developed behavioural adaptations to bypass this.

The young generally undergo metamorphosis from larva with gills to an adult air-breathing form with lungs. Amphibians use their skin as a secondary respiratory surface and some small terrestrial salamanders and frogs lack lungs and rely entirely on their skin. They are superficially similar to reptiles like lizards, but unlike reptiles and other amniotes, require water bodies in which to breed. With their complex reproductive needs and permeable skins, amphibians are often ecological indicators; in recent decades there has been a dramatic decline in amphibian populations for many species around the globe.

The earliest amphibians evolved in the Devonian period from sarcopterygian fish with lungs and bony-limbed fins, features that were helpful in adapting to dry land. They diversified and became ecologically dominant during the Carboniferous and Permian periods, but were later displaced in terrestrial environments by early reptiles and basal synapsids (mammal predecessors). The origin of modern amphibians belonging to Lissamphibia, which first appeared during the Early Triassic, around 250 million years ago, has long been contentious. However the emerging consensus is that they likely originated from temnospondyls, the most diverse group of prehistoric amphibians, during the Permian period.

A fourth group of lissamphibians, the Albanerpetontidae, became extinct around 2 million years ago. The number of known amphibian species is approximately 8,000, of which nearly 90% are frogs. The smallest amphibian (and vertebrate) in the world is a frog from New Guinea (Paedophryne amauensis) with a length of just 7.7 mm (0.30 in). The largest living amphibian is the 1.8 m (5 ft 11 in) South China giant salamander (Andrias sligoi), but this is dwarfed by prehistoric temnospondyls such as Mastodonsaurus which could reach up to 6 m (20 ft) in length. The study of amphibians is called batrachology, while the study of both reptiles and amphibians is called herpetology.

Classification

The word amphibian is derived from the Ancient Greek term (amphíbios), which means 'both kinds of life', meaning 'of both kinds' and βίος meaning 'life'. The term was initially used as a general adjective for animals that could live on land or in water, including seals and otters. Traditionally, the class Amphibia includes all tetrapod vertebrates that are not amniotes. Amphibia in its widest sense (sensu lato) was divided into three subclasses, two of which are extinct:

* Subclass Lepospondyli (A potentially polyphyletic Late Paleozoic group of small forms, likely more closely related to amniotes than Lissamphibia)
* Subclass Temnospondyli (diverse Late Paleozoic and early Mesozoic grade, some of which were large predators)
* Subclass Lissamphibia (all modern amphibians, including frogs, toads, salamanders, newts and caecilians)

** Salientia (frogs, toads and relatives): Early Triassic to present—7,360 current species in 53 families. Modern (crown group) salientians are described via the name Anura.
** Caudata (salamanders, newts and relatives): Late Triassic to present—764 current species in 9 families. Modern (crown group) caudatans are described via the name Urodela.
** Gymnophiona (caecilians and relatives): Late Triassic to present—215 current species in 10 families. The name Apoda is also sometimes used for caecilians.
** Allocaudata (Albanerpetontidae) Middle Jurassic – Early Pleistocene

These three subclasses do not include all extinct amphibians. Other extinct amphibian groups include Embolomeri (Late Paleozoic large aquatic predators), Seymouriamorpha (semiaquatic to terrestrial Permian forms related to amniotes), among others. Names such as Tetrapoda and Stegocephalia encompass the entirety of amphibian-grade tetrapods, while Reptiliomorpha or Anthracosauria are variably used to describe extinct amphibians more closely related to amniotes than to lissamphibians.

The actual number of species in each group depends on the taxonomic classification followed. The two most common systems are the classification adopted by the website AmphibiaWeb, University of California, Berkeley, and the classification by herpetologist Darrel Frost and the American Museum of Natural History, available as the online reference database "Amphibian Species of the World". The numbers of species cited above follows Frost and the total number of known (living) amphibian species as of March 31, 2019, is exactly 8,000, of which nearly 90% are frogs.

With the phylogenetic classification, the taxon Labyrinthodontia has been discarded as it is a polyparaphyletic group without unique defining features apart from shared primitive characteristics. Classification varies according to the preferred phylogeny of the author and whether they use a stem-based or a node-based classification. Traditionally, amphibians as a class are defined as all tetrapods with a larval stage, while the group that includes the common ancestors of all living amphibians (frogs, salamanders and caecilians) and all their descendants is called Lissamphibia. The phylogeny of Paleozoic amphibians is uncertain, and Lissamphibia may possibly fall within extinct groups, like the Temnospondyli (traditionally placed in the subclass Labyrinthodontia) or the Lepospondyli, and in some analyses even in the amniotes. This means that advocates of phylogenetic nomenclature have removed a large number of basal Devonian and Carboniferous amphibian-type tetrapod groups that were formerly placed in Amphibia in Linnaean taxonomy, and included them elsewhere under cladistic taxonomy. If the common ancestor of amphibians and amniotes is included in Amphibia, it becomes a paraphyletic group.

All modern amphibians are included in the subclass Lissamphibia, which is usually considered a clade, a group of species that have evolved from a common ancestor. The three modern orders are Anura (the frogs), Caudata (or Urodela, the salamanders), and Gymnophiona (or Apoda, the caecilians). It has been suggested that salamanders arose separately from a temnospondyl-like ancestor, and even that caecilians are the sister group of the advanced reptiliomorph amphibians, and thus of amniotes. Although the fossils of several older proto-frogs with primitive characteristics are known, the oldest "true frog", with hopping adaptations is Prosalirus bitis, from the Early Jurassic Kayenta Formation of Arizona. It is anatomically very similar to modern frogs. The oldest known caecilians are Funcusvermis gilmorei (from the Late Triassic) and Eocaecilia micropodia (from the Early Jurassic), both from Arizona. The earliest salamander is Beiyanerpeton jianpingensis from the Late Jurassic of northeastern China.

Authorities disagree as to whether Salientia is a superorder that includes the order Anura, or whether Anura is a sub-order of the order Salientia. The Lissamphibia are traditionally divided into three orders, but an extinct salamander-like family, the Albanerpetontidae, is now considered part of Lissamphibia alongside the superorder Salientia. Furthermore, Salientia includes all three recent orders plus the Triassic proto-frog, Triadobatrachus.

Additional Information

Amphibians are small vertebrates that need water, or a moist environment, to survive.

The species in this group include frogs, toads, salamanders, and newts. All can breathe and absorb water through their very thin skin.

Amphibians also have special skin glands that produce useful proteins. Some transport water, oxygen, and carbon dioxide either into or out of the animal. Others fight bacteria or fungal infections. And at least one—in each species—is used for defense.

To warn potential predators, the most toxic amphibians are also the most brightly colored. Curare [kyoo-RAW-ree], for example, is found on the skin of colorful poison dart frogs. Another special feature of most amphibians is their egg-larva-adult life cycle. The larvae are aquatic and free-swimming—frogs and toads at this stage are called tadpoles. At a certain size, the young develop limbs and lungs. Some also lose their tails. Eventually, they hop or climb out of the water as adults, and spend the rest of their lives on land. This process is known as metamorphosis.

Like reptiles, amphibians are cold-blooded. Because of their special skin, they require very specific living conditions. Too much sun can damage their cells. Too much wind can dry their skin and dehydrate the animal. As a result, amphibians are the first to die off when their habitats are disturbed or contaminated with chemicals like weed killers. This is the main reason over half of all frog species are in danger of extinction.

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#1 2024-03-19 17:04:23

Amphibians

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