Courtesy Dong Lin California Academy of Sciences

Nembrotha chamberlaini Gosliner and Behrens 1997

Everted penis of Nembrotha chamberlaini was dissected out at a 1/5 mm length. The tissue was then dried in several alcohol washes. After placement on a metal post, it was sputter coated with gold. This process, although a short cut for critical drying, worked excellently, as seen in the above scanning electron micrograph . The white bar in the photo represents 150 microns. That's small! That means the spined section of the penis is about 300 microns long and the spines themselves are only about 50 microns in length!

The above information courtesy of:

Terry Gosliner and David W. Behrens

Coauthors: Coral Reef Animals of the Indo-Pacific

Send Dave mail at seachalleng@earthlink.net

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