Summary
The attachment of the body of the snail Lymnaea stagnalis to the shell was studied by histochemistry and light and electron microscopy. Muscles of the body wall insert into the connective tissue by way of long thin projections of sarcolemma. The muscle cells end under the basement membrane of a specialised area of the epidermis, the adhesive epithelium. The cells of this epithelium are filled with microfilaments and possess characteristic knob-like microvilli. The epithelium is attached to the shell by way of an adhesive substance containing proteins and mucopolysaccharides.
This research was made possible by a grant from the Netherlands Organization for Pure Research (Z.W.O.)
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The author would like to thank Dr. H.H. Boer and Prof. Dr. J. Lever for their critical interest in the problem and for reading the manuscript and Miss J.K. Bosma for typing the manuscript. Thanks are also due to Mr. C. Bakker for cheerful technical assistance, to Dr. G.J. Brakenhoff for discussions and to the University of Amsterdam for the use of the scanning electron microscope
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Plesch, B. Shell attachment in the pond snail Lymnaea stagnalis (L.). Cell Tissue Res. 171, 389–396 (1976). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00224663
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00224663