Flat Worms

Cross references:   Protostome        Bilateria    Bilateria Locomotion     Deuterostomes  

Flatworm (Wiki) 
    "The flatworms, known in scientific literature as Platyhelminthes or Plathelminthes (from the Greek πλατύ, platy, meaning "flat" and ἕλμινς (root: ἑλμινθ-), helminth-, meaning worm)[2] are a phylum of relatively simple bilaterian, unsegmented, soft-bodied invertebrate animals. Unlike other bilaterians, they have no body cavity, and no specialized circulatory and respiratory organs, which restricts them to flattened shapes that allow oxygen and nutrients to pass through their bodies by diffusion."  
In traditional zoology texts Platyhelminthes are divided into Turbellaria, which are mostly non-parasitic animals such as planarians, and three entirely parasitic groups: Cestoda, Trematoda and Monogenea. Turbellarians are mostly predators, and live in water or in shaded, humid terrestrial environments such as leaf litter.
    "Small aquatic species use the cilia for locomotion, while larger ones use muscular movements of the whole body or of a specialized sole to creep or swim. Some are capable of burrowing, anchoring their rear ends at the bottom of the burrow and then stretching the head up to feed and then pulling it back down for safety. Some terrestrial species throw a thread of mucus which they use as a rope to climb from one leaf to another.[6]"


The Territorial Imperative (Goog) 
    "It took little effort for Best and Rubinstein to demonstrate that the worm could not only learn to choose, but could learn with dismaying aptitude... By the third session -- a speed of learning difficult to believe -- most worms hit their peaks and chose correctly four times out of five."      
    "One out of every three planarian worms mastered the double-ambiguity problem. Sometimes when they reached the fork they would hesitate, pointing their heads first one way then the other, as if trying to make up their "minds." In animal study this is known as "vicarious trial-and-error behavior." Sometimes, unable to make up their "minds," they would go back to the starting point and begin again.