Question

Explain the structure of compound eye of insects.

Answer 1

Arthropod eyes are called compound eyesbecause they are made up of repeating units, the ommatidia, each of which functions as a separate visual receptor.

Each ommatidium consists of

a lens (the front surface of which makes up a single facet)a transparent crystalline conelight-sensitive visual cells arranged in a radial pattern like the sections of an orangepigment cells which separate the ommatidium from its neighbors.

The pigment cells ensure that only light entering the ommatidium parallel (or almost so) to its long axis reaches the visual cells and triggers nerve impulses. Thus each ommatidium is pointed at just a single area in space and contributes information about only one small area in the field of view.

There may be thousands of ommatidia in a compound eye with their facets spread over most of the surface of a hemisphere. (The photo, courtesy Carolina Biological Supply Company, shows the compound eye of Drosophila melanogaster.)

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