Sentences with phrase «sea squirts»
The phrase "sea squirts" refers to marine animals that resemble squishy, tubular sacks with small openings. They get their name because when squeezed, they squirt out water. Full definition
That marine biologist Ernst Haeckel's drawings of sea squirts resemble antique Christmas ornaments, or that his jellyfish look like the balusters of a Louis Sullivan staircase, is more than coincidental.
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Most sea squirts are little more than rubbery blobs that stick to shells and rocks on the sea floor.
If sea squirts, and not amphioxus, truly are the vertebrate's closest relative, then researchers studying vertebrate evolution may have to reinterpret morphological, developmental, and paleontological clues about how vertebrates got their start, concludes Philippe.
Consider the stalked tunicate — also known by the delicious - sounding name «Asian sea squirt» — which has taken over what used to be blue mussel habitat from Maine to New Jersey.
The alien sea squirt, which is indigenous to the Philippines, is considered a fouling organism and a pest by the shellfish industry.
A team led by Junyuan Chen from the Nanjing Institute of Paleontology and Geology found 305 specimens, 30 of them complete, of an early chordate — a member of a broad group that comprises not only vertebrates but also more primitive invertebrates such as sea squirts and lancelets.
Even soil - living or flesh - eating bacteria, engineered viruses, weed extracts, microwaves, chemicals from Antarctic sea squirts and the immune cells of siblings have been recruited to destroy tumours.
While the jellyfish invasion has helped decimate the winter flounder population in Narragansett Bay, the non-native sea squirt may overrun the local oyster and blue mussel communities.»
Sections of the reef are bedecked with thousands of yellow and white sea squirts, and, more usually for Komodo, tiny bright yellow sea cucumbers.
It seems that Dr. Kurzweil will have to come up with a silicon turtle that relishes sea squirts to sustain the exponential human drive to the stars and have the cod too.
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In turn, giant kelp positively affected the sessile invertebrates — sponges and sea squirts — that live on the bottom but can often be outcompeted for space by algae.»
And it's an honest warning: the nudibranch incorporates chemicals from the skin of its primary prey, sea squirts, into a foul - tasting mucus that predators deplore.
A 2007 expedition revealed that sea squirts had taken over the area of the seafloor once shaded by Larsen A.
With its segmented muscles, amphioxus looks more like a vertebrate than does a sea squirt.
Vertebrate - like traits in the sea squirt larva (top) prompted the sequencing of its genome.
They compared 146 genes in many chordates, including hagfish and lamprey (considered the most primitive vertebrates) and larvaceans, which are sea - faring relatives of sea squirts.
Thus, researchers had assumed the sea squirt was a distant cousin to the other chordates.
In fact, Gutt saw a vibrant scene: hundreds of sea squirts, the kind of animal — so characteristic of the deep — for which analogies invariably seem strained.
The sea squirts, he thinks, are recent colonizers from open water, but the sea cucumbers are probably remnants of the original ecosystem from before the collapse of the Larsen Ice Shelf.
The artificial lights reduced colonization of the panels by the sea squirt, Botrylloides leachi, and the sea bristle, Plumaluria setacea, filter feeders that dine on nutrients and plankton from the water column and keep coastal ecosystems healthy, the team reports online today in Biology Letters.
Corals, sea squirts, sponges and tube worms all begin life as larvae floating in the water, and other research teams have shown that they too respond to compounds released by bacteria as signals to attach themselves to rocks or other surfaces and transition to a new life form.
These are the mouse, the rat, two puffer fish, two fruit flies, two sea squirts, two roundworms, baker 19s yeast and the bacterium Escherichia coli.
Sponges, sea squirts, anemones and turtles are commonly spotted.
The east coast bays tend to be more rocky — ideal for exploring the small rockpools and gullies for weird and wonderful sea creatures such as wild fish, crabs, sea squirts, starfish and anemones.
Characteristics: relaxing drift dive with rock formations, plenty of soft corals and hard corals, clams, nudibranchs, feather stars, sea squirts, tropical fish
Next stop — Horseshoe Bay at Rinca Island — here you can find one of the top 10 divesites in the world — Cannibal Rock — huge variety of coral, sponges, sea squirts, rare black corals, turtles, cuttlefish, and an abundance of reef fish too!
The underwater concrete has a good and colourful display of marine growth, including both hard and soft corals, sea squirts, feather stars, and barnacles.
As you drift north through the channel, the topography shifts from a gentle slope to steep wall, festooned with colourful soft corals, huge gorgonian sea fans, and sea squirts and tunicates in a multitude of sizes and shapes.
The walls field an incredible amount of colourful filter feeders, such as sea apples, sea squirts, tunicates and crinoids.
While waiting for a bite fishing for mackerel from a floating dock, I'd stick my head down close to the water and peer at the fascinating assemblage of small shrimp, sea squirts and other creatures growing on the immersed wood and floats.