Sponge

Sponges (also known as sea sponges), the members of the phylum Porifera (/pəˈrɪfərə/; meaning 'pore bearer'), are a basal animal clade as a sister of the diploblasts. They are multicellular organisms that have bodies full of pores and channels allowing water to circulate through them, consisting of jelly-like mesohyl sandwiched between two thin layers of cells.

Porifera
Temporal range:
A stove-pipe sponge
Scientific classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Porifera
Grant, 1836
Classes
Synonyms

Parazoa/Ahistozoa (sans Placozoa)

Sponges have unspecialized cells that can transform into other types and that often migrate between the main cell layers and the mesohyl in the process. Sponges do not have complex nervous, digestive or circulatory systems like humans. Instead, most rely on maintaining a constant water flow through their bodies to obtain food and oxygen and to remove wastes. Believed to be some of the earliest animals alive today, sponges were possibly the first to branch off the evolutionary tree from the last common ancestor of all animals, which would make them the sister group of all other animals.

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