Ciliary feeding structures and particle capture mechanism in the freshwater bryozoan Plumatella repens (Phylactolaemata)

Abstract. In contrast to marine bryozoans, the lophophore structure and the ciliary filter‐feeding mechanism in freshwater bryozoans have so far been only poorly described. Specimens of the phylactolaemate bryozoan Plumatella repens were studied to clarify the tentacular ciliary structures and the particle capture mechanism. Scanning electron microscopy revealed that the tentacles of the lophophore have a frontal band of densely packed cilia, and on each side a zigzag row of laterofrontal cilia and a band of lateral cilia. Phalloidin‐linked fluorescent dye showed no sign of muscular tissue within the tentacles. Video microscopy was used to describe basic characteristics of particle capture. Suspended particles in the incoming water flow, set up by the lateral ‘pump’ cilia on the tentacles, approach the tentacles with a velocity of 1–2 mm s^‐1. Near the tentacles, the particles are stopped by the stiff sensory laterofrontal cilia acting as a mechanical sieve, as previously seen in marine bryozoans. The particle capture mechanism suggested is based on the assumed ability of the sensory stiff laterofrontal cilia to be triggered by the deflection caused by the drag force of the through‐flowing water on a captured food particle. Thus, when a particle is stopped by the laterofrontal cilia, the otherwise stiff cilia are presumably triggered to make an inward flick which brings the restrained particle back into the downward directed main current, possibly to be captured again further down in the lophophore before being carried to the mouth via the food groove. No tentacle flicks and no transport of captured particles on the frontal side of the tentacles were observed. The velocity of the metachronal wave of the water‐pumping lateral cilia was measured to be ～0.2 mm s^‐1, the wavelength was ～7 μm, and hence the ciliary beat frequency estimated to be ～30 Hz (～20 °C). The filter feeding process in P. repens reported here resembles the ciliary sieving process described for marine bryozoans in recent years, although no tentacle flicks were observed in P. repens. The phylogenetic position of the phylactolaemates is discussed in the light of these findings.