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Because they are able to bypass death, the number of individuals is spiking. Did they like ... just evolve or something? You'd think they'd have spiked before
by glhaynes 17y ago
Because they are able to bypass death, the number of individuals is spiking.
Did they like ... just evolve or something? You'd think they'd have spiked before now and reached equilibrium.
- kiba 17y agoI think they got eaten instead. Biological immortality no good if you get ate pretty soon.
- glhaynes 17y agoIf it's not one thing it's another.
- electromagnetic 17y agoThey've reached true immortality when they can go in one end of an animal and come out the other still alive.
- derefr 17y agoLots of animals can do that, although the ones that can survive in a body—for example, tapeworms—usually start preferring to survive in that body (it relieves you of all the work of creating a biological equilibrium of your own), so they evolve to hold on inside instead of coming out.
- hristov 17y agoGood point. This might have something to do with global warming and extinction of predators.
- CUViper 17y agoAccording to one of the linked articles, they are suspected to be hitchhiking in the ballast of large ships, so their habitat is unnaturally expanding. There could always be other factors too, like an over-fished predator.
- jared314 17y agoThat sounds similar to the C. taxifolia Algae threat. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/algae/chronology.html http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/algae/chronology.html
- biotech 17y agoGood observation. A spike in population implies a recent change in the organism or its environment. Since most multicellular organisms cannot evolve that quickly, it's more likely that there was a change in the environment which this organism was able to take advantage of. I doubt that their numbers are spiking because "they are bale to bypass death".
- daniel-cussen 17y agoThey are jellyfish, and jellyfish thrive on the recent development that is large amounts of nitrates in the oceans. Think greenhouse gases, but instead of heat in the atmosphere, it's algae and jellyfish in oceans.
- andr 17y agoOverfishing is the culprit here. With less fish in the seas jellyfish - immortal and regular - can procreate much more easily, and have access to more food. Here's a relevant article: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/273850 http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/273850 I am surprised the tourism lobbies are not fighting the fishing lobbies on that one.
- by 17y agoAlthough the subject is interesting the page, published on 16th March 2010, is poorly researched blog-spam. It is essentially just copied from one of the numerous pages that say the same thing, such as this one published on 27th January 2009 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/4357829/Immortal-jellyfish-swarming-across-the-world.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/4357829/Immortal-j... The picture is not of Turritopsis nutricula, but T. rubra according to this page http://www.ville-ge.ch/mhng/hydrozoa/hydrozoa-directory.htm http://www.ville-ge.ch/mhng/hydrozoa/hydrozoa-directory.htm This is Maria's page http://www.personal.psu.edu/mum31/ http://www.personal.psu.edu/mum31/ and the related journal article about ships' ballast is here http://www.springerlink.com/content/81747575j2707j4g/ http://www.springerlink.com/content/81747575j2707j4g/