Other Salt Glands
摘要
This chapter deals with other species that have developed salt glands to deal with environmental challenges similar to those facing the shark. These are species that, because of the environmental conditions or dietary pressure, face the need to secrete the extra salt they take in. This group includes birds, crocodiles, iguanas, lizards, turtles, and sea snakes. Their glands have various anatomical locations: within the orbit in birds, iguanas, lizards, and turtles, in the tongue as in crocodilians, and under the tongue in sea snakes. The regulatory mechanism for the secretion of salt has been defined only for the avian salt glands. In birds, ANP and VIP are involved just as in the shark. The mechanism by which salt is secreted by the glands has also been defined only for the avian salt gland. The mechanism is similar to that of the shark rectal gland. Although not enough information is currently available to ascertain how these glands in these species are regulated and secrete salt, there are hints that they work in the same way. The underlying significance of the variety of glands in different species that seem to work in similar ways is that collectively they represent examples of convergent evolution. In addition to elasmobranchs, many other species have specialized glands that secrete salt and therefore come under the denomination of salt glands. Among them are the avian salt glands that are found in birds whose habitat is marine or live along the seashore line. Salt glands are found also in marine reptiles, including sea snakes, sea turtles, crocodiles, and lizards. Although salt glands share many commonalities, their anatomical location varies considerably among the different species that possess them. Some have been well described others have not. For some the elements that activate them are known; for others they remain to be elucidated. In general, they share many of the elements that mediate the transport of salt, but the processes that mediate such transport have not been well characterized if at all in all of them. The following is a brief review of the salt glands found in some of these species.