• Email Us: [email protected]
  • Contact Us: +1 718 874 1545
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Medical Market Report

  • Home
  • All Reports
  • About Us
  • Contact Us

Watch A Deep-Sea “Disco Worm” Sparkle Off The Coast Of Chile

November 13, 2024 by Deborah Bloomfield

The deep sea is home to a lot of weird creatures. Some are brand new species living in the midnight zone, while others are recorded visiting the depths of the ocean in something of a surprising move. The deep sea gives rise to all sorts of adaptations and in the case of this recently recorded species, ended up making something akin to a deep-sea disco ball.

The team at Schmidt Ocean Institute were using their 3,200-kilogram (7,055-pound) remotely operated vehicle (ROV) SuBastian off the coast of Chile when the ROV captured footage of an unusual creature roaming across the sea floor. With black bristles that sparkle in the light from the submersible, the creature resembles a disco caterpillar making its way along while other creatures leap out of the way. 

Advertisement

The disco caterpillar is actually a polychaete, a type of deep-sea worm known as a bristle worm, for obvious reasons. There are around 13,000 species of polychaete that live in marine ecosystems all across the world. These species include everything from the bloodworms (shudder) to the downright ridiculous but aptly named pigbutt worm. 



“Each body segment has a pair of fleshy protrusions called parapodia covered in bristles called chaetae. Some worms are bioluminescent, but this sassy sparkler has protein structures in the bristles that make them iridescent,” Schmidt Ocean explained on Instagram on November 4. 

Some polychaetes form symbiotic relationships with bacteria and can survive the extremely high-temperature differences found on hydrothermal vents. Other polychaetes live on a diet of plankton and marine snow that falls from higher up in the ocean to the sea floor. As such they play an important role in the marine ecosystem cleaning up detritus at the bottom of the sea. 

Advertisement

The polychaete was seen as part of the #ChileMargin2024 mission. This is a 55-day mission that will see the team exploring the submarine canyons along the Nazca plate. Off the west coast of Chile, the continental shelf drops steeply into the Pacific Ocean and runs the entire length of South America. 

The team plans to investigate hydrothermal vents and hydrocarbon seeps along this area that have never previously been visited by a scientific ROV. 

Deborah Bloomfield
Deborah Bloomfield

Related posts:

  1. Cricket-Manchester test likely to be postponed after India COVID-19 case
  2. EU to attend U.S. trade meeting put in doubt by French anger
  3. Soccer-West Ham win again, Leicester and Napoli falter
  4. Was Jesus A Hallucinogenic Mushroom? One Scholar Certainly Thought So

Source Link: Watch A Deep-Sea "Disco Worm" Sparkle Off The Coast Of Chile

Filed Under: News

Primary Sidebar

  • Mammals Have Evolved Into Ant Eaters 12 Times Since The Dinosaurs Went Extinct
  • Thieving Pulsar Spinning 592 Times A Second Reveals New Understanding Of Where Its X-Rays Come From
  • The Rise And Fall (And Lamentable Rise) Of The “Alpha Male” Myth
  • IFLScience The Big Questions: How Do Black Holes Shape The Universe?
  • North America’s Smallest Turtle Is The Cutest Thing You’ll Find In A Bog
  • “Unambiguous Signal” To Curb Emissions Now: Long-Lost Aerial Photos Reveal Evolution Of Antarctic Ice Shelf Collapse
  • 8 Children Have Been Born With 3 Biological Parents Each After Mitochondrial Transfer
  • First Known Observations Of Matter-Antimatter Asymmetry In Special Particle Decay
  • In 1973, NASA Sent Two Spiders Into Space To See If They Can Spin Webs – And They Learnt A Lot
  • Meet The Many Species Of Freaky Looking “Assassin Spiders” That Only Eat Other Spiders
  • Your Dog’s TV Preferences Might Reveal Their Personality
  • Some Human Gut Bacteria Can Absorb Harmful Toxic “Forever Chemicals” So They Can Be Pooped Out
  • You Could Float Through 10 Countries Before The World’s Most International River Spat You Out
  • Enormous Coronal Hole And Beast-Like Crawling Prominences Dazzle On The Active Sun
  • Dramatic Drone Footage Of Iceland’s Latest Volcanic Eruption Shows An Epic Scene From Hell
  • A Shrimp That Lives In A Tree? Indonesia’s Cyclops Mountains Are Home To Some Seriously Strange Wildlife
  • Is NASA’s Claim That Saturn Could Float On Water Really True?
  • Pangea Proxima: This Is What Planet Earth May Look Like 250 Million Years In The Future
  • The Story Of Dogxim, The Fox-Dog Hybrid That Shouldn’t Have Existed
  • Neanderthal Butchers From Different Caves Had Their Own Specialities
  • Business
  • Health
  • News
  • Science
  • Technology
  • +1 718 874 1545
  • +91 78878 22626
  • [email protected]
Office Address
Prudour Pvt. Ltd. 420 Lexington Avenue Suite 300 New York City, NY 10170.

Powered by Prudour Network

Copyrights © 2025 · Medical Market Report. All Rights Reserved.

Go to mobile version