CAS: Science Explorations

Dear 5th Grade,

As we begin studying the classification of living things, I thought you would enjoy seeing some recently “discovered” species… Below is a description of a couple of  interesting new species of 2011, from the National Geographic Website:

“Pink Meanie” Jellyfish

Photograph courtesy Don Demaria

Off the Florida Keys (map), hundreds of stinging tentacles dangle from a “pink meanie”—a new species of jellyfish with a taste for other jellies that was discovered in January.

Like other species in the genus Drymonema, the new jelly has an appetite for moon jellyfish, which the predators feed on almost exclusively as adults.

Adult Drymonema do the majority of their digestion using specialized “oral arms” that dangle alongside their tentacles. The oral arms exude digestive juices, which break down the prey, scientists said in January.

Cyclops Shark

Photograph courtesy Marcela Bejarano-Álvarez

An extremely rare cyclops shark, recently confirmed in Mexico, is an editor’s pick for one of the ten oddest life-forms found in 2011.

The 22-inch-long (56-centimeter-long) fetus has a single, functioning eye at the front of its head, scientists announced in October. The eye is a hallmark of a congenital condition called cyclopia, which occurs in several animal species, including humans. Scientists have documented cyclops shark embryos a few times before, said Jim Gelsleichter, a shark biologist at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville. The fact that none have been caught outside the womb suggests cyclops sharks don’t survive long in the wild.

From 2009:
Coin-Sized Frog

Below is a photo from National Geographic News:

March 26, 2009–As the smallest known frog species in the world’s second largest mountain range, this new amphibian is easy to miss.

But scientists searching the Andes mountains’ upper Cosnipata Valley in southern Peru, near Cusco, spotted the coin-size creature–a member of the Noblella genus–in the leaf litter of a cloud forest between 9,925 and 10,466 feet (3,025 and 3,190 meters).

From 2005
Kiwa hirsuta

(aka”Yeti-Crab”,  “Hairy Lobster”, and “The Hoff” )

From: BBC New.uk

Furry ‘lobster’ found in Pacific

Marine biologists have discovered a crustacean in the South Pacific that resembles a lobster or crab covered in what looks like silky fur.

Kiwa hirsuta is so distinct from other species that scientists have created a new taxonomic family for it.

A US-led team found the animal last year in waters 2,300m (7,540ft) deep at a site 1,500km (900 miles) south of Easter Island, an expert has claimed.

Details appear in the journal of Paris’ National Museum of Natural History.

The diving expedition was organised by Robert Vrijenhoek of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California.

The “Yeti Crab”, as it has been dubbed, is white and 15cm (5.9in) long, according to Michel Segonzac of the French Research Institute for Exploitation of the Sea (Ifremer).

In what he has described as a “surprising characteristic”, the animal’s pincers are covered with sinuous, hair-like strands. It seems to reside around some Pacific deep sea hydrothermal vents, which spew out fluids that are toxic to many animals.

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