Researches on the Visual Organs of the TrilobitesLindström, Gustaf
Science
Researches on the Visual Organs of the Trilobites
Lindström, Gustaf
Trilobites
The lenses, as seen in a vertical section of the eye of Asaphus
expansus, (pl. I fig. 12), are columnar prisms, like the pillars of
basalt, attaining a length of 0,2 mm and at the point where the eye
joins the test of 0,3 mm. At their interior extremity they have a
breadth of 0,066 mm. On that point the surface is convex and at the
exterior surface plane. They are closely packed and in a transverse
section resemble a pavement of regular hexaeders. But they also assume
other shapes and become rhombs or even quadrates, as seen in a specimen
of Asaphus fallax (pl. I fig. 18), where the hexaeders and quadrates
lie side by side without transitional forms. As a rule the lenses
become more and more irregular in the vicinity of the surrounding
frame or near the suture, nearly blotted out, as it were, and without
any definite border line mingled with the confused, spongy mass that
like a belt or a frame surrounds they eye in Asaphus and is sharply
limited from the other part of the free cheek. This remarkable zone
which is almost only present amongst the Asaphidæ (Asaphus, Megalaspis,
Ptychopyge, Isotelus) retains in a confused manner somewhat of the
prismatic structure of the eye as shown in the section (Pl. I, fig. 11,
b). The eye of Bumastus also is environed by a similar zone, with a
structure like that of the eye (Pl. II fig 35, 41).
In an undetermined species of Asaphus the lenses, although somewhat
apart, are of an elongated hexaedric outline, which passes into a
regular circular one farther away and on the surface of the eye they
are slightly convex (Pl. I figs 27-29). In other genera belonging
to this group the shape of the lenses are like those of Asaphus, so
for instance in Illænus (I. chiron and I. Esmarki) and in Niobe. In
Dysplanus centrotus they are shorter and broad, and their interior
or lower surface strongly convex. It is likewise so in Nileus, where
Nileus armadillo has an exceedingly thick exterior integument above
the lenses. Such an integument has in a still higher degree increased
in Bumastus sulcatus so as to exceed in thickness the stratum of the
corneal prisms and it may in fact be doubted if the eyes of this
species ever were able to function as visual organs. Proetus nearly
resembles Bumastus in the thickness of the integument covering the
prismatic lenses, which are interiorly convex, with a diameter of 0,03
mm.
In all genera belonging to this group a horizontal section gives the
image of the hexaeders as in Asaphus with some change to squares or
rhombs.
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