Because Brisingid Starfish are Fantastic! Stunning Images of Brisingids in the Deep!

This image from NOAA Photo Library. Here. 

Brisingid starfishes were my first professional "love".. I wrote my Masters thesis on them and it was almost 2 years after studying specimens like this...

Before I saw one that was alive!  Now, THAT is dedication for you! 

What are brisingid starfish?? Long story short... Strange deep-sea starfish. They are proper, albeit highly modified sea stars that use their spines, covered with tiny claws which act as velcro to capture tiny prey as food.

This is Novodinia. Photo form NOAA Okeanos Explorer

Here's my first post about them which explains their biology.

Another post about the interesting etymology of the name. 

I was just noticing that there's been a great critical mass of REALLY wonderful pictures of these animals.

For example, here's an amazing close up shot of Novodinia, possibly N. americana from the R/V Okeanos Explorer cruise to the North Atlantic canyons in 2013.  What you're seeing is the disk at the center, surrounded by the many spines covering each of its arms...

This image originally from NOAA Photo Library here. 

shots like these are increasingly common..but trust me when I say that scientists from the mid late 20th Century would have KILLED to have nice high definition picture like this!

Another Pic of Novodinia americana? from 2013. NOAA Photo Library. 

And here was one AMAZING bit of anecdotal observation/biology from the 2013 North Atlantic Okeanos Explorer cruise, this brisingid, unclear which genus, based purely on the pic not only caught a fish but HELD onto it using ONLY its pedicellariae.

Pedicellariae are tiny claw-shaped structures that cover each of those spines..sort of like staples embedded in a sock. These capture various food and prey items.. but mostly it was thought they captured crustaceans. Capturing fish is a bit unusual....

Food caught by the spines and on the surface are then moved down to the underside to the mouth...

Colleague Jackson Chu, provides us with a GREAT pic of the UNDERSIDE of a brisingid, showing the mouth, tube foot grooves and etc.. just what you would expect from any proper sea star...
                    

Here are some stunning panoramic shots of brisingids. Presumably, these occur on places where water currents are favorable for them to capture food...  Both of these are from the North Atlantic via Okeanos Explorer..

These animals feed by holding their arms up into the water and capturing food/prey as it is carried by on the water currents...

This shot was from a spur projecting from the canyon wall in the North Atlantic (Block Canyon) in 2062-2131 m. 

This pic from 2013 Atlantic Canyons Expedition

Here are some great shots from Neptune Canada via Flickr...  A large individual, maybe Brisinga? on a sunken barrel..

                    
some very "at attention" individuals...

                          
Not all species occur on hard bottoms.. Some live on mud and sediment...

This one from the NE Canyons expedition in 2013

And just for a little diversity, From Japan, here is the underside of what I think is Brisingaster or Novodinia... These likely represent an unpublished record of this species in Japan..

Here is what the top side looks like...

Video & Images from the Census of Marine Life Big Wrap Up!

So, the big Census of Marine Life is racing towards its final year in 2010 and a big end-of the year press release has hit the media, including the video below!

If ya' skip over all of the jellies and other non-echinoderm (but still pretty cool) animals, towards the end is a GREAT video of the swimming sea cucumber Enypniastes from the Gulf of Mexico!! (shown above):


There's been a flurry of "best of" type photos, including this cool shot of a bunch of brisingids (Novodinia spp.) and a goniasterid (looks like Evoplosoma) perched on a bunch of deep-sea corals in and around New Zealand (>1000 m based on the original captions).
Its a light Echinoblog week but here in the US, its Thanksgiving week, and everything is just a little bit slower! Especially with everything getting colder and darker!

There will continue to be sporadic, light posts this week..with next week back to "normal"...

Enjoy!

Bioluminescence 2009 Expedition! Swimming Cuke Video & MORE!

New!
Echinoderm Image & Video Highlights from the 2009 Bioluminescence Expedition! (from deep-sea Bahamas)

Video of the deep-sea SWIMMING holothurian Hansenothuria benti Miller & Pawson (graciously identified by Dave Pawson, Curator of Echinoderms at the NMNH!) shown here being captured by the Johnson Sea Link submersible!



Three Endoxocrinus maclearanus flank a purple sea fan with a snake star.

(Image from the Bioluminescence 2009 Expedition, NOAA/OER website)

The Deep-Sea brisingid starfish, Novodinia. Probably Novodinia antillensis...

(Image from the Bioluminescence 2009 Expedition, NOAA/OER website)

Stalked Crinoid in repose...(Image from the Bioluminescence 2009 Expedition, NOAA/OER website)

Dr. Charles "THE MAN" Messing. Crinoid expert, snappy dresser, thespian, and dude!! He discovered a new species while on this cruise ...

(Image from the Bioluminescence 2009 Expedition, NOAA/OER website)

May I introduce...Brittlestar City!!!

(from NIWA 2008)

Wow!
Over the weekend, what can only be described as an enormous echinoderm suspension feeding colony was discovered on Macquarie Ridge by the R/V Tangaroa operated by my good friends at NIWA in Wellington, New Zealand. This involved scientists working in association with the Census of Marine Life.

Video can be seen here.

Looks to be a MASSIVE group of Ophiacantha spp., including Ophiacantha otagoensis and Ophiacantha fidelis

(from NIWA 2008)

And not to be left out..a brisingid suspension feeding starfish. Hard to see which one it is from here...

(from NIWA 2008)

This was not only ophiuroids and asteroids...but also sea urchins, corals, sponges, and seems to be conspicuously dominated by invertebrates...

To quote directly from the CENSEAM Press Release:

Census of Marine Life-affiliated scientists, plumbing the secrets of a vast underwater mountain range south of New Zealand, captured the first images of a novel "Brittlestar City" that colonized against daunting odds the peak of a seamount - an underwater summit taller than the world's tallest building.

Its cramped starfish-like inhabitants, tens of millions living arm tip to arm tip, owe their success to the seamount's shape and to the swirling circumpolar current flowing over and around it at roughly four kilometers per hour. It allows Brittlestar City's underwater denizens to capture passing food simply by raising their arms, and it sweeps away fish and other hovering would-be predators.

This has started to pick among the International News...

Could this be another example of the Paleozoic style ecosystem we discussed in the Antarctic last week?