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In some fish, capillary blood flows in the opposite direction to the water, causing countercurrent exchange. The muscles on the sides of the pharynx push the oxygen-depleted water out the gill openings. In bony fish, the pumping of oxygen-poor water is aided by a bone that surrounds the gills called the operculum. [6]
The shared trait of breathing via gills in bony fish and cartilaginous fish is a famous example of symplesiomorphy. Bony fish are more closely related to terrestrial vertebrates, which evolved out of a clade of bony fishes that breathe through their skin or lungs, than they are to the sharks, rays, and the other cartilaginous fish. Their kind ...
The gill arches of bony fish typically have no septum, so the gills alone project from the arch, supported by individual gill rays. Some species retain gill rakers. Though all but the most primitive bony fish lack spiracles, the pseudobranch associated with them often remains, being located at the base of the operculum.
The swim bladder, gas bladder, fish maw, or air bladder is an internal gas-filled organ in bony fish (but not cartilaginous fish [1]) that functions to modulate buoyancy, and thus allowing the fish to stay at desired water depth without having to maintain lift via swimming, which expends more energy. [2]
Many bony fishes have an internal organ called a swim bladder, or gas bladder, that adjusts their buoyancy through manipulation of gases. In this way, fish can stay at the current water depth, or ascend or descend without having to waste energy in swimming. The bladder is only found in bony fishes.
Osteichthyes (/ ˌ ɒ s t iː ˈ ɪ k θ iː z / ost-ee-IK-theez), [2] also known as osteichthyans or commonly referred to as the bony fish, is a diverse superclass of vertebrate animals that have endoskeletons primarily composed of bone tissue.
Branchial arches or gill arches are a series of paired bony/cartilaginous "loops" behind the throat (pharyngeal cavity) of fish, which support the fish gills. As chordates, all vertebrate embryos develop pharyngeal arches, though the eventual fate of these arches varies between taxa.
Bony fish have similar gill opercula, but the basalmost ray-finned fish, bichirs, use their spiracles for inhaling air into their lungs; this leads to speculation this may be the original air breathing mechanism ancestral to all bony fish and tetrapods. [9]