How much do you know about octopuses? Besides the fact that they have eight legs? For example, do you know how many hearts an octopus has? Yes, yes, the question was asked absolutely correctly. After all, an octopus has not one heart, but several! Or what are these creatures capable of?
Let's figure it out. And not only how many hearts an octopus has, but in general what kind of animal it is and where it can be found.
Huge clam
The octopus (photo below) is a cephalopod. These creatures live in the seas around globe, starting from the Arctic and ending with the Antarctic. But still, octopuses cannot tolerate fresh water, give them a salinity of at least 30 percent.
Their sizes are also very different: from a few centimeters to 6-7 meters. But still " average height“For them it’s 1.5-2 meters. The largest octopuses live off the coast of Colombia: some weigh 15-20 kg, and the length of their tentacles varies from 2 to 2.5 meters, and sometimes more!
The largest octopus was discovered in Western Canada. weighed 242 kilograms, and the length of its tentacles reached 10 meters! It must be a terrible sight. Now all the stories of sailors about krakens capable of sinking ships no longer seem like just stupid fairy tales.
External structure of an octopus
Octopuses have a soft oval body covered in a mantle (skin-muscle sac). The mantle can be smooth, with pimples, or wrinkled (depending on the type of octopus). Inside, underneath, there are organs.
The mantle also serves as water storage. Since the octopus is a sea creature, it cannot exist without water. In order to crawl onto land, it requires liquid reserves. This reserve is enough for four hours. However, cases have been recorded when octopuses remained on land for more than a day.
The octopus has large eyes on its head, like most representatives of deep-sea creatures, with square-shaped pupils.
The octopus's mouth is small, with a pair of strong jaws. Outwardly, it somewhat resembles the beak of a parrot. That is why it is called “beak”. In the mouth there is a lingual outgrowth (“odontophora”). On both sides of the body there are gills, which are responsible for extracting oxygen from the water.
Tentacle hands
Eight tentacle arms extend from the head and surround the mouth. On the inside of each tentacle there are suction cups, with the help of which the octopus is able to hold prey or stick to underwater objects. There can be up to 220 suction cups on one “hand”! Interesting fact lies in the fact that there are suction cups. So octopuses are truly unique: they are able to see with their limbs!
Octopus tentacles are the most often targeted by enemies. Therefore, nature endowed octopuses with the ability to tear off their limbs in order to escape. The enemy will only have the trophy. This property in science is called autotomy. The tentacle muscles begin to contract so strongly that they rupture. Literally within a day, the wound begins to heal, and the limb grows back. Like a lizard, you might say. But no. A lizard can only drop its tail in a certain place, no more, no less. And the octopus can tear off its “arm” wherever it wants.
Internal structure of an octopus
Octopuses have a huge brain, which is protected by a cartilaginous capsule (skull). The brain consists of 64 lobes and even has the rudiments of a cortex. Biologists compare the intelligence of an octopus to that of a domestic cat. Octopuses are capable of emotions and are very smart. They have a good memory and are even able to distinguish geometric shapes.
Like other creatures, octopuses have a liver, stomach, glands, and intestinal tract. Thus, the esophagus on its way to the stomach penetrates the liver and brain. The esophagus is very thin, therefore, before swallowing food, the octopus crushes it well with its “beak”. Then, already in the stomach, it digests food with the help of digestive juice, which is produced by the liver and pancreas. In the stomach of the octopus there is a process - the caecum, which is responsible for the absorption of useful substances. The octopus liver is a large, brown, oval-shaped organ. It performs several functions at once: absorbs amino acids, produces enzymes and stores nutrients.
In the occipital part of the skull there are organs of balance - statocysts. These are bubbles containing liquid and calcareous stones (statolites). When the octopus's body changes position in space, the pebbles move and come into contact with the walls of the vesicles covered with sensitive cells, which greatly irritates the octopus. This is how he can navigate in space even without light.
In a special extension of the rectum, the octopus stores a supply of poisonous ink, which serves as an excellent means of protection. The skin (more precisely, the mantle of an octopus) contains specific cells: chromotophores and iridiocysts, which are responsible for the ability to change color. The former contain black, red, brown, yellow and orange pigments. The latter allow the octopuses to turn purple, green, blue or metallic.
Octopuses have highly developed muscles and skin in many places with capillaries, which serve to transition arteries into veins.
How many hearts does an octopus have?
So, we come to this question that worries many. It is already clear that these creatures have more than one heart. But then how much? Probably everyone will be surprised now. After all, an octopus has 3 hearts. Three! None of the representatives of mammals, amphibians or birds have such a phenomenon. Yes, there are four-chambered hearts, like those of mammals, three-chambered ones, like those of amphibians, or generally single-chambered ones. But everyone has one heart!
Then why does an octopus have 3 hearts? Let us recall that the heart is a muscle that, contracting at a certain speed, pumps blood in a living organism. So, which includes the octopus, they have not very “successful” gills: they create a strong Therefore, one heart simply could not cope with it.
How do they work?
So, in an octopus, One is the main thing, which drives blood throughout the octopus’s entire body. This heart consists of two atria and a small ventricle. And one more heart near each gill (the octopus has two of them). These hearts are smaller. They help the main muscle push blood through the gills, from where it, already filled with oxygen, returns to the atrium of the large heart. That's why they are called "gills".
No matter how many hearts an octopus has, they all beat the same way. The frequency of their contractions depends on the temperature of the water in which the creature is located. So, than colder water, the slower the hearts beat. For example, at a temperature of 20-22 degrees, muscles contract about 40-50 times per minute.
By the way, the heart of an octopus, more precisely the heart, is far from the only feature of the mollusk. His blood is also very peculiar. Just imagine, she is blue! The thing is that it contains the enzyme hemocyanin, which contains copper oxides.
One to help the other
In March 2009, it became known about a unique surgical operation performed at the Heart Institute in Sao Paulo (Brazil).
A fifty-three-year-old patient whose heart was already refusing to pump blood was transplanted into the right side of his chest with a donor heart, leaving his own in the same place. The “new” heart was connected by blood vessels to the “old” one.
It was reported that the operation lasted 12 hours and that the patient's condition was stable. However, doctors expressed concern that the patient’s chance of survival was 50%. “The next 72 hours will be critical,” said the surgeon who performed the transplant, Alfredo Fiorelli. And he added that in the current situation it would not be recommended to do a traditional transplant, so the only alternative is to “plant” a second heart and maintain the patient in such an artificially created state for two months. There is hope that the donor heart will still take over the basic functions of its own, which will beat slower and slower...
However, many questions remained. If everything goes according to plan, will it be necessary to remove the “main” heart later? And where is such confidence that it will beat more and more slowly? Or maybe over time it will, on the contrary, begin to work normally?
My heart was rested and...
It turns out that back in 1996 in London, the famous heart surgeon Magdi Yacoub transplanted a donor heart into a two-year-old girl, Hannah Clarke, leaving her own in place. At that time, due to cardiomyopathy, it was already twice its normal size, and doctors predicted that in a maximum of a year the heart would not withstand the load. After the operation, the girl had to take medications to suppress the reaction of rejection of the donor heart, and it seemed that everything was going fine for Hannah. So 10 years passed.
However, in 2006, she suddenly began to experience this same rejection reaction. The donor heart needed to be urgently removed and a try to connect our own. Surgeons had never done anything like this before. They were advised by the same Magdi Yakub, already a pensioner. And then the surprises began!
Instead of 8 hours, the operation took 4, instead of several months, Hannah spent only 5 days in the intensive care unit. She quickly recovered and soon began to even dream about some kind of sports competition. It turns out that the girl’s own heart has had a good rest over the years, gained strength and “learned” to work normally. The donor “double” simply became superfluous, so the body began to reject it!
Two in one
But it happens that a person is born with two hearts. Back in 1905, thirty-five-year-old American carpenter A. Durr placed an advertisement in one of the newspapers that he was ready to bequeath his body and his two hearts to anyone who would immediately pay him good money. Durr was a big guy, which was confirmed by experts, and one even offered 10 thousand dollars for the right to remove one of the two hearts during his lifetime. But the carpenter refused, fearing that he would not have time to enjoy this money if something went wrong.
In Russia, too, they have known about this phenomenon for a long time. In 1911, a reference book on surgery was published in Yekaterinburg, which contains a diagram with the caption: “Ognivtsev’s phenomenon. A man with two hearts." But who is he, this Vladimir Ognivtsev? So, a rural paramedic, whose fate is not even really known.
But then in January 2004 Russian newspapers talked about a resident of Ingushetia from the village of Inarki, Malgobek district. Until the age of forty-seven, Zyaudin Yandiev did not even think that he had two hearts. And although some doctor told him this as a child, Zyaudin soon forgot about the second heart. He served in the army, worked, and visited doctors more than once, but no one noticed the amazing anomaly, out of habit they applied a stethoscope to the left side of his chest. And only in 2003, when he was hospitalized with blood poisoning, “the cardiologist literally jumped in surprise when, while taking a cardiogram, one of the electrodes suddenly moved to the right side and froze,” recalls Z. Yandiev. At this point he was examined in full!
One is good, but two is better!
Let us note that in most cases, these phenomenal people do not even know for years that they have two hearts. Why? Because they don’t go to doctors - they have good health. Even if the second heart is not in place. So, in July 2004, doctors in Tbilisi examined one-year-old baby Goga Diasamidze from Batumi: he had one heart in chest, and the second - in abdominal cavity. But even in this case, the body adapted!
There is also a known case in Ukraine, when a fifty-year-old man was diagnosed with a “tumor”, which in fact turned out to be a second heart! This man had never consulted a doctor before - his health was fine.
In general, it seems that the body “doesn’t mind” two hearts! Moreover, a child with a “spare” heart grows more resilient and strong, and copes more easily with physical activity(and here there is something for biologists, geneticists, and futurologists to think about).
But, in this case, why didn’t nature take care of duplicating this most important organ for all of us during evolution? After all, we have two lungs, kidneys or eyes! And the heart is one. And the power of this “pump” is not so great. It is capable of pushing blood into all vessels, down to the smallest capillaries, of which there are 100-160 billion in our body, but it is difficult for it to deliver venous blood back. But it turns out that the numerous “mini-hearts” scattered throughout our body help the heart push blood. These are muscles.
According to Nikolai Arinchin, corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of Belarus, we have 1008 such “hearts” (according to the number of skeletal muscles). And if the muscles become decrepit, it becomes very difficult for the heart. Moral: if you want to live, help your heart, train all your muscles!
Genes and chromosomes?
Recently, Elvira Chernikova began looking for her cousin. Her aunt Valentina Dedyukhina once had a son weighing 4.5 kg in Irkutsk - a healthy and strong baby. The gynecologist who delivered the child said, however, that the child was not viable because he had two hearts and persuaded the woman to write a refusal. After that, both the child and that gynecologist (childless, by the way) disappeared from the maternity hospital - maybe the doctor adopted the baby. And after some time, Dedyukhina’s sister also gave birth to a son with two hearts. “Now he is an adult,” says Elvira, “his heart works like a clock, the rhythm is clear and strong. So we decided to look: maybe our cousin will show up somewhere in Irkutsk?”
What does this mean? "Family" phenomenon? Maybe some recessive (ancient) gene was triggered in both sisters? Maybe once all our ancestors had two hearts? It is no coincidence that a human embryo also initially has two hearts, but then they are combined into one (eyes, by the way, are the opposite: at first the embryo has one eye, then it is divided into two).
Rutgers University anthropologist Susana Kachel argues that the system of one heart and two lungs began to emerge about 300 million years ago, when aquatic groups of radishes first began to crawl onto land (by the way, the octopus still has three hearts). And perhaps it is no coincidence that the human embryo first resembles a fish, an amphibian, and only much later - a mammal, which succeeded each other in the course of evolution until their transformation into Homo sapiens? But our genetic memory is still no, no, and it will give out two hearts - so to speak, “the old fashioned way”!
The human body never ceases to amaze doctors and scientists with its peculiarities. One such phenomenon is people with two hearts. Moreover, some of them lived long years and had no idea about their uniqueness.
They had excellent health, which allowed them not to see doctors. And the presence of a second heart made the body more resilient and made it easier to cope with physical activity.
From the history
In 1844, Dorge Lippert was born in Germany, who had three legs. He earned his living in the circus of the largest American hoaxer, Phineas Taylor Barnum, in which unusual people were shown.
Fact: “The Russian boy Fyodor Evtikhiev, who was born with a hairy face, also performed in this circus.”
After Lippert's death in 1906, an autopsy revealed that there were two hearts in his chest. At the same time, during his lifetime, neither he nor those around him had any idea about this.
In 1905, an advertisement appeared in American newspapers for a 35-year-old carpenter named Durr, in which he was ready to hang his body with two hearts to anyone who would pay a large sum of money.
Several experts examined the carpenter and came to a unanimous conclusion: the carpenter really has two hearts, and he is completely healthy. A group of doctors offered him $10,000 for an operation to remove one of the hearts while he was alive, but Durr refused due to fears of complications after the operation.
In 1911, a reference book on surgery was published in Yekaterinburg, which contained information about the rural paramedic Vladimir Ognivtsev, who also had two hearts. At the same time, the reference book even showed a diagram of the movement of blood in his body.
As medical technology develops
As medical technology developed, evidence of people with two hearts began to be supported by authoritative examinations using the most precise instruments.
Ramo Osmani constantly undergoes medical examinations throughout his life. However, with the exception of this phenomenon, his body is not very significantly different from others. He is more resilient than other people, but with the onset of fatigue he needs longer rest.
In 2004, a second heart was discovered in a one-year-old boy from Georgia, with one circulatory organ located in the chest and the other in the abdominal cavity. A few years later, a second heart was discovered in a 50-year-old man from Ukraine.
In 2004, in a number of Russian media a note was published about Zyaudin Yandiev from the village of Inarki, Malgobek region of Ingushetia, who at the age of 47 was discovered to have two hearts. The man rarely went to doctors, although he underwent a medical examination in the army. During examinations, doctors routinely applied a stethoscope to the left side of the chest and determined the parameters of the circulatory organ, without suspecting that it was not the only one. At the end of 1999, Zyaudin, due to blood poisoning, was admitted to a hospital in the city of Nalchik, where, while taking a cardiogram, the doctor noticed that one of the electrodes had sharply moved to the right, and discovered that the patient had two hearts.
After recovery, Zyaudin underwent a full examination, as a result of which no other pathologies were identified. In his medical card A note was made: “The patient Yandiev, born in 1956, had two hearts - on the right and on the left.”
In 2004, Zyaudin was taken to the hospital with a heart attack of two hearts. The man recovered quite quickly, but doctors noted: a simultaneous heart attack confirms that two hearts in the body behave like one and form a single system.
Stopping two hearts
In 2010, in Verona, an elderly man was found unconscious on the street, with difficulty breathing and low blood pressure. He was taken to the emergency room, where doctors suspected a heart attack and administered medication. The man's name is not disclosed due to medical ethics.
During the examination, the man was found to have two hearts. Due to a medication chosen due to a medical error, both hearts stopped. With the help of a defibrillator, doctors managed to beat them again, and after recovery the patient left the clinic.
It turned out that he was not born with two hearts - the second organ was a donor and transplanted several years ago. The transplanted heart not only took root, but caused stable functioning of the first circulatory organ, the condition of which improved dramatically. Due to the wrong entry medicinal product The main heart stopped, followed by a failure in the donor heart.
Second heart transplant operations
In London in 1996, the famous heart surgeon Magdi Yacoub performed a donor heart transplant on two-year-old Hannah Clarke.
The girl’s own heart was twice as large as usual and could not withstand the load. The surgeon left the original heart in place and transplanted the donor organ into the right side of the chest.
The girl lived with two hearts for 10 years. However, in 2006, a rejection reaction began in her body (it was because of the possibility of such a situation developing that the doctor left the girl’s native heart).
By this time, Magdi Jacob had already retired and did not perform operations, but only consulted surgeons. Doctors suggested either suppressing the rejection reaction or starting the girl’s own heart. The results of the operation exceeded all expectations, and instead of the planned several months, Hannah spent only 5 days in the clinic. Fact:
“During 10 years of functioning of the donor organ, the girl’s native heart was restored, and working in tandem with the donor’s, it gradually became the same in all respects.”
After the removal of the donor organ, Hannah quickly recovered and even actively took up sports.
In March 2009, in the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo, surgeon Alfredo Fiorelli performed a donor heart transplant on a 53-year-old patient. The patient's native organ was also left in place, and both hearts were connected by blood vessels. The patient tolerated the operation well, and the doctors noted that the worn-out native heart began to work much better than before.
Brothers with two hearts
A few years later, Valentina Dedyukhina’s sister also gave birth to a boy with two hearts! The man lived to an old age, had good health and both hearts worked properly. Now Elvira was trying to find that same cousin who disappeared in 1937.
Based on this case, we can make the assumption that this phenomenon may have a genetic connection - after all, the birth of people with two hearts happened among sisters.
The birth of a new race
Rutgers University anthropologist Suzanne Kachel has been studying people with two hearts for a number of years. According to her, the system of one heart and two lungs originated about 300 million years ago, when animals began migrating from water to land. Initially, a human embryo has two two-chambered hearts in the womb, which then merge into one four-chambered one. According to Suzanne, the presence of two hearts in a mature person is a manifestation of gene memory, when the process of two paired embryos is disrupted for some reason and each of them develops into an independent heart. And if the work of both circulatory organs is harmonious, a person lives a normal healthy life.
By this time, Magdi Jacob had already retired and did not perform operations, but only consulted surgeons. Doctors suggested either suppressing the rejection reaction or starting the girl’s own heart. The results of the operation exceeded all expectations, and instead of the planned several months, Hannah spent only 5 days in the clinic.“Scientists have noticed that the number of people with two hearts is gradually increasing every year.”
Octopuses are one of the most mysterious sea creatures. Many people wonder how many hearts an octopus has.
Octopuses are one of the most mysterious sea creatures
No place on Earth contains as many diverse and strange creatures as the seas and oceans. Many inhabitants seabed are the oldest representatives of the planet, much older than humans and all animals. One of these creatures is the octopus, a cephalopod whose size can reach 7-8 m.
Octopuses can be different. Thus, their size varies from a few centimeters to 8 m. The weight of the largest octopus was more than 200 kg, although it usually still does not exceed 15-20 kg.
No place on Earth contains as many diverse and strange creatures as the seas and oceans
The question of its color can be perplexing: this mollusk comes in different colors, and they are also capable of changing their appearance almost instantly. Therefore, very different descriptions can be applied to an octopus.
They have a soft oval body, similar to a ball, dressed in something resembling a mantle - a skin-muscular sac that can be smooth or pimply, depending on the type of mollusk. There are 8 tentacles on the body that surround the octopus's mouth.
The mollusk catches prey thanks to special suction cups located on the inside of the tentacles. There are a lot of these suckers - several hundred on one “hand”.
Tentacles are needed not only to grab prey: they also have visual analyzers that allow them to assess the surrounding environment.
Many inhabitants of the seabed are the oldest representatives of the planet, much older than humans and all animals
The mollusk has prominent eyes. They are huge and occupy about 10% of the entire body; the size of the eyeball can reach 40 cm. In terms of the anatomical structure, octopuses’ eyes are similar to human eyes, but they still have a slightly different scheme for perceiving the world.
The only solid part of the octopus's body is its beak, which is similar to a bird's beak. It is this that can become a limitation for the mollusk in trying to crawl into any hole, since the rest of its body is so soft that it can penetrate any crevice.
The internal structure of the octopus has always aroused interest among people, since many people know the fact that it has several hearts. Therefore, a common question is how many hearts does an octopus have? This mollusk has 3 cardiac muscles.
This feature is explained by the fact that they have a very strong blood resistance, which the heart simply could not cope with. Thus, this mollusk is the only representative of the animal world that has as many as 3 hearts.
Octopus Volcano (video)
Features of the cardiac system
One of the octopus's 3 hearts is the main one - it pumps blood throughout the body. It is larger in size than the others and consists of two atria and a small ventricle. This heart bears the main burden of ensuring the vital functions of the body.
The other two cardiac organs can be called accessory - they are smaller in size, located near the two gills and are muscular extensions of blood vessels. They help the main organ move blood throughout the body. Because of the peculiarity of their work, they are also called “gills”. They distill venous blood, which is enriched with oxygen in the gills and then enters the atria of the main organ.
Thus, we can distinguish the types of heart organs in octopuses:
- The main thing;
- auxiliary.
However, different work does not affect the frequency of their beating - the octopus has three hearts that beat in the same rhythm. This cannot but cause admiration - 3 hearts of a huge mollusk beating in one beat. The frequency of the beat depends on the temperature of the water: the colder the water, the slower the heart beats. On average, the frequency is reduced to 40 times per minute.
The octopus also has unique blood, which has an amazing blue color, as well as high intelligence, proven by many studies. So 3 hearts distill not just blood, but a blue liquid.
Worth mentioning special weapons octopuses - ink bomb. The mollusk has a special organ in its body - an ink sac filled with liquid, which the octopus throws out in case of danger. As a result, an ink curtain is formed, allowing you to hide from any enemy that might attack the octopus.
Giant octopus (video)
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Hagfish - rare representative a vertebrate that does not have a backbone. The hagfish has a skeleton - in the form of a skull. But there is no spine. These creatures are classified as lower vertebrates. That is, they are no longer worms, but also not fish - the predecessors of fish.
Hagfishes settle in subtropical and temperate waters throughout the World Ocean. In Russia, for example, they can sometimes even be found in the Barents Sea. But the greatest diversity of species is found off the western coast of North America.
According to research, hagfish have remained almost unchanged over the past 300 million years. The hagfish's primitive appearance, which has long since gone out of fashion among fish, and disgusting eating habits have led people to consider the hagfish one of the most disgusting sea monsters. But this is all just because she is less like us, modern creatures, than others.
The body of the hagfish resembles the body of a huge worm, half a meter in length. The goliath hagfish sometimes reaches a size of 127 centimeters. The hagfish is almost the only creature on Earth that can tie itself into a knot.
Now let's see what's inside the hagfish. She has four hearts, two brains and one nostril. But the hagfish has the same number of eyes as we do; vertebrates have two. True, they are quite primitive. With the help of such eyes, hagfish can see light, but not a specific image.
In some hagfish species there is only one male per hundred females. Representatives of other species are completely hermaphrodites. So there is no threat to the survival of the hagfish, even if “the men move away.”
The key to high survival rate is unpretentiousness in food. The hagfish eats carrion or dying animals. As a rule, it tears out pieces of meat, makes a hole and thus penetrates inside the creature. And eats him up. Divers often see gnawed skeletons of some dolphins with a thick hagfish inside. Sometimes hagfish eat fish caught in a fishing net, which can barely move.
Hagfish are eaten in Japan and Korea.
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