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deeply in an submerged canyon off the glide of Puerto Rico , there ’s a political party of balloon - similar ocean wight restrain things gay in the abyssal profoundness .
Their body are modest — about the size of a golf game golf tee ( just over 2 inches , or 6 centimeters , long ) — but they ’re vibrant ; when the creatures move and beat , words of tiny hair - corresponding ciliarefractlight into a optical prism of shining colors .
The new comb jelly looks like a two-pronged “party balloon."
researcher at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ( NOAA ) first spotted these mysterious party blobs in 2015 , spy three of them near the seabed at a depth of just about 13,000 feet ( 4,000 meters ) . Now , in a newspaper published Nov. 18 in the journalPlankton and Benthos research , the team has key the blob as a novel coinage of ctenophore – - tiny invertebrate predator also have it away ascomb jelliesor " sea walnut " – - calledDuobrachium sparksae .
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While their bitty bodies and shimmering cilia are traits commonly share among the 100 - plus known ctenophore species , the Puerto Rican party blobs still represent an exciting first in marine biology . According to the researchers , this is the first underwater mintage NOAA researchers have ever key from pictures alone ; the squad had no access to forcible samples for their newfangled field of study .
Each comb jelly sports 8 rows of cilia that refract light into a prism.
" The cameras on the [ remotely control ] Deep Discoverer golem are able to get high - resolution image and touchstone structures less than a millimeter , " field co - author Allen Collins , a NOAA piscary scientist , order in a statement . " We do n’t have the samemicroscopesas we would in a lab , but the video can give us enough information to understand the morphology in detail . "
Despite their name , comb jelly are not related tojellyfish , though they do share a like gelatinous appearance . D. sparksaeis no elision , with eight rows of prickly cilia roll around a translucent body . That body ends at two item attached to long , slight tentacle , giving the beast an appearance like a floating balloon with two " dangly bits , " each attached to its own drawing string , Collins said .
One of the three specimens the team encountered seemed to be " anchored " to the seafloor by its tentacle , the researchers wrote . Using a pair of lasers on their submersed golem , the researchers appraise the approximate distance of that specimen ’s trunk and tentacle , finding the tentacle to be roughly five multiplication as long as jelly ’s body ( each tentacle was 12 inches , or 30 centimeter , long ) . When the jelly move , it moved " like a hot airwave balloon , " uphold a specific altitude above the ocean floor , said pencil lead study generator Michael Ford , also of NOAA .
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Many query remain about these baffling , recondite - ocean jellies , including what function they act in their ecosystem . More video recording footage of the blob will provide extra cue , but to conduct a crucialDNAanalysis researchers will have to get their gloves on an actual integral specimen . That may be easier said than done , as jelly - like animals have a very short shelf - life outside of the deep sea , the researchers said .
" Even if we had the equipment , there would have been very picayune time to work on the animal because gelatinlike animals do n’t continue very well ; ctenophores are even worse than jellyfish in this regard , " Collins tell . " High - caliber video and photography were crucial for describing this young species . "
in the beginning publish on Live Science .
