Scientists Discover Strange Creature in a Seemingly Inhospitable Ecosystem

The discovery of this creature increases the total count of new species identified by researchers exploring these seemingly inhospitable ecosystems to 48.
Greg Rouse, a marine biologist at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography, and other researchers have identified a previously unknown species of deep-sea worm residing near a methane seep located approximately 50 kilometers (30 miles) away from Costa Rica’s Pacific coast. Rouse, curator of the Scripps Benthic Invertebrate Collection, co-authored a study describing the new species in the journal PLOS ONE.

The worm, named Pectinereis strickrotti, has an elongated body that is flanked by a row of feathery, gill-tipped appendages called parapodia on either side, and Rouse said its sinuous swimming reminded him of a snake. The species was named after Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution’s Bruce Strickrott, lead pilot for the famed deep-sea submersible Alvin, who Rouse said was instrumental in the effort to locate and collect the creature. The research was supported by the National Science Foundation.