Scientists Find 30 Potential New Species at Bottom of Ocean

Scientists have found more than 30 potentially new species living at the bottom of the sea. From a report: Researchers from the UK's Natural History Museum used a remotely operated vehicle to collect specimens from the abyssal plains of the Clarion-Clipperton Zone in the central Pacific. Previously, creatures from this area had been studied only from photographs. The study, published in the journal Zookeys, found there is a high species diversity of larger organisms in the abyss. Of the 55 specimens recovered, 48 were of different species. The animals found include segmented worms, invertebrates from the same family as centipedes, marine animals from the same family as jellyfish, and different types of coral. Thirty-six specimens were found at more than 4,800 metres deep, two were collected on a seamount slope at 4,125 metres, and 17 were found at between 3,095 and 3,562 metres deep.

It's always the last place you look

[narcc]

We should have checked there earlier. It's the world's couch cushion.

username checks out

[algaeman]

marine animals from the same family as jellyfish, and different types of coral. You mean coral???

Bring them to LA, we'll eat them...

[cayenne8]

LOL, my first thought was, wonder how these things'll do in gumbo?

If it swims, we'll cook it and make it taste good!!

A little Tony Chacherie's goes well on everything!

Re:

[arglebargle_xiv]

Since all the new species found feeding at the bottom are different varieties of lawyer, I don't think they'd do very well in gumbo.

Accurate science reporting? Not!

[isopodz]

Nonsense alert! The Guardian made a potentially interesting story completely muddled. "Same family as centipedes"??? For one thing, centipedes are a diverse *Terrrestrial* Class of Arthropods many different families; none of them are found in the oceans. The Zookeys article (which is an open publication) referenced by the Guardian article has no mention of centipedes but does mention Scapellomorph barnacles, which are marine crustaceans, the dominant arthropod class in today's oceans. At least jellyfish are Cnidarians, but certainly not the "same family as jellyfish"; same problem as the "centipede" quote. I get that newspapers have to avoid a lot of jargon so people will understand their articles, but they could at least tried to be a bit more accurate, or maybe run the article past one of the scientists to weed out the silly things. The other issue is the quotes in the article from some of the scientists, where they are attempting to make their research look new and interesting. As it happens, megafauna - the big things they are talking about - have been studied in this area for decades and are relatively well known. Organizations do this a lot to promote their funded and hopefully to be funded research but the attitude that they were the "first" is just plain rubbish. The scientists did discover a bunch of new species of sea floor critters but this is what happens when you do any detailed biological research anywhere in the deep sea. One of the smaller sized groups, peracarid crustaceans, are incredibly diverse. Crustacean assemblages change in species composition rapidly over the vast expanse of the central Pacific Ocean. Rough calculations estimate that one group alone is known from only a tiny fraction of the total species possible in the entire study region of the Pacific. The article didn't really get into why in the world anyone would fund expensive deep sea research in the middle of the Pacific. Once one knows that the polymetallic nodules (consisting mostly of metal oxides) that grow spontaneously at the sea floor in this region contain mostly manganese oxides and iron but also smaller traces of nickel, cobalt and rare earth minerals, one can see why the mining companies might be very interested. International government regulators get involved to make sure permanent damage is not done to the environment by the proposed mining. This leads to the funding for the research that helps fill in the what is known and what is unknown (which in this case is a lot!). [Full disclosure - my 2017 article was referenced by the Zookeys article]

it's a classic for a reason

[NFN_NLN]

> Scientists Find 30 Potential New Species at Bottom of Ocean

Are they all of the Genus "Lawyeris" from the Family of Bottom Feeders?

Forget the worms...

[TwistedGreen]

Did they find Rapture?

Shows how little we know.

[RockDoctor]

FTFS : 55 specimens, from 48 species (so, 7 species with 2 specimens, or one species with 7 specimens), of which 30 species were previously undescribed. That's over 60% of the species found being previously undescribed.

Truly, we don't know much about the less accessible parts of the planet's surface.

specimens were found at more than 4,800 metres deep, [..] at 4,125 metres, [...] 3,095 and 3,562 metres deep

Anyone taking bets that the ROV's umbilical cable is only 5km long?