Sometimes – you just get a week of amazing science discoveries! Let’s chit chat about some of those amazing instances, shall we??
SQUID EATS A BOMB
1) A squid was caught off the coast of China with a BOMB found inside of it. Yes, a bomb. The 18-inch live bomb was found inside a 3-foot squid being sliced open at a Chinese fish market in Jiaoling county. Perhaps the bomb resembled a small fish or prawn, but who knows how long the squid swam around for with live ammo in its tummy!? Local police suspect that the bomb was dropped by a fighter jet…it was rusty so it’s hard to tell exactly how long it has been floating (in the ocean/in the stomach of the squid) for. This is not the first instance of a bomb being found inside a marine animal – in 2007, the remains of a 19th century timer bomb was found inside a bowhead whale.
ACTIVE MICROBIAL COMMUNITY FOUND IN THE DEEPEST PART OF THE OCEAN
2) Imagine living in a place with 1,000 times the pressure placed upon your entire body at normal sea level..no thank you! But, researchers have discovered that microbes, found at the Mariana’s Trench, thrive on the falling detritus (dead animal remains) that fall to the depths of the ocean floor even under the intense pressure! The microbes are an important component of the carbon cycle in the ocean – keeping the process going by digesting organic matter and thus releasing CO2.
GIANT SQUID FROM ACROSS THE GLOBE ARE A SINGLE SPECIES
3) Giant squid bodies have been found spanning the globe, and it’s been confirmed that the DNA from 43 squid found around the world, in all actuality vary surprising little. The lack of genetic diversity is quite astounding knowing that Giant Squid span across all oceans with a relatively large population size. Some researchers think that this could because squid mitochondria may have evolved unusually slowly, or they could have recently expanded from a small to large population size.
FISH BRAIN ACTIVITY CAPTURED ON FILM
4) Researchers have visualized and recorded the activity of almost every individual neuron in the larval zebrafish brain in REAL TIME! This is an amazing feat! “It allows a much better view of the dynamics through the brain during different behaviors and during learning paradigms,” states Joseph Fetch, a neurobiologist from Cornell University. The researchers were able to capture more than 80% of the 100,000 neurons in the brain of the larval zebrafish, snapping high-res pics every 30 milliseconds.