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Giant Cortical Glial Cells in the Central Nervous System of Insects

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Abstract

Cortical glial cells are located in the neuron body layer of the brain and the ganglia of the ventral nerve cord. There are at least two size classes of cortical glia: small-cell and “giant-cell,” which have large, apparently polyploid nuclei. As a result of an examination of brains in 152 species from 13 orders of hemi- and holometabolous insects, it was found that the small-cell cortical glia is characteristic of the majority of insects. The giant cortical glia is composed of presumably polyploid cells. It is characteristic of Lepidoptera and Trichoptera and is also found in some species of Heteroptera, Hymenoptera, and Coleoptera. A special type of glia with polytene chromosomes was found in the dipterans of the superfamily Muscoidea.

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  1. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Russian Academy of Sciences, 119071, Moscow, Russia

    A. A. Panov

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Translated by M. Batrukova

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Panov, A.A. Giant Cortical Glial Cells in the Central Nervous System of Insects. Biol Bull Russ Acad Sci 49, 512–523 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1134/S106235902205017X

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