#larval cell
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DAY 20 YEEEEEEHAWW
#dbz#cellvember#dragon ball z#cell#android 17#android 18#android 16#android 19#android 13#larval cell
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Ok but imagine this but larva cell.
Say no more...
Getting through my asks slowly but surely hehe, this one was just too cute. Next time, maybe I should do genetically modified fluffy cell? In any case, hope u enjoy!^^
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Imperfect Cell is easily Cell’s most intimidating form. Semi perfect Cell is just an ugly looking dude and Perfect Cell is just a guy in a stupid costume. But Imperfect Cell with his long ass tail, weird beak, weird head and just general inhuman appearance.
Definitely a monster.
Edit: Oh! I got polls! Let’s see other peoples opinions
From left to right: Imperfect Cell, SemiPerfect Cell, Perfect Cell
Larval Cell
#dragon ball z#dbz#dragon ball#db#Cell#android saga#imperfect cell#semi perfect cell#perfect cell#larval cell#tumblr polls
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i have a crippling bug phobia but ohhhh he is so silly
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Big Guide to Humans: Lifespan and Development
Humans are not invincible, but despite their reputation for risk-taking, most humans do not die of injuries. Mostly, they die of time.
Unlike many species that reach an adult stage and stay there until something (disease, war, mating, cultural practices) kills them, human bodies are in a constant progression into and through maturity. At the end of this progression, their cells damage themselves or each other faster than they can recover from, the human becomes weaker until one or more organ systems ceases function (beyond the ability of medicine to repair), and the human dies.
Most humans measure their age in "years," a time measurement based on their home planet. (A human in a non-human-majority ship or settlement will often figure out the formula for local time conversion soon after arrival; if the formula is not in your records, simply ask them.) A human with no abnormalities may live, on average, to around 150 "years," though this varies based on their personal history and genetics, with some humans being noticeably infirm before 100, and 200 years being rare but not unheard of. Diseases, injuries, and most abnormalities lower this span, some by a great deal and/or abruptly.
All Humans begin life as "babies," not literally a larval stage but similarly underdeveloped, in which for the first year of life they are unable — physically or intellectually — to walk or talk. For another year or two they are not able to do them very fluently. (Their external genitalia are present as part of their excretory system, but with no reproductive ability.) They are entirely dependent on their guardians (often but not always their biological parents).
For the next eight to twelve years, they experience mostly steady growth, mentally and physically. Sexual dimorphism is negligible when clothed. Hair and clothing styles are used to signal gender, but this is based on human culture and requires a certain level of expertise to interpret. Although they are still dependent on their parents for securing provisions and for being taught, they are mobile and can take care of their short-term needs. Especially at the end of this range, other humans would consider it safe to leave them briefly unattended.
At approximately twelve years old, plus or minus two years, or plus/minus four or more in extreme cases, they enter a multi-year stage of rapid growth called "puberty" in which their reproductive system begins to mature and they start to display sexual dimorphism. By around 18 years of age, and almost certainly by age 20, they will have reached their full adult height and level of "secondary sexual characteristics," the most obvious being a deeper voice and facial hair for males (though they may remove the hair for aesthetic reasons) and breast weight for females, along with body hair and that particular human scent.
During this time, they are nearly as intellectually capable as an adult human. However, as they are experiencing adult emotions for the first time, their moods can be unstable. Additionally, their understanding of risk is poor even by human standards, and it is important to check with their guardians before engaging in activities that you may be tempted to think sound reasonable for a human.
Because their intellectual and emotional development lags sharply behind their reproductive development, and because they do not have a "finished" adult stage, humans have declared "18 years old" to be when adulthood begins and one is allowed to register for military service, enter into legal agreements, consume mind-altering substances, and engage in cross-species sexual relationships.
!! Clarification: If you mate with or even attempt to mate with a human under 18 years old, they will not be punished. You will face severe repercussions from the human and/or Unified legal systems, in addition to high risk of humans' Protected Cultural Practice of violence to protect family and children. !!
As imprecise as developmental timing is before adulthood, it is even more so afterward. It is simply not possible to give an accurate accounting of when certain markers of human age will appear, or even in what order. Like a human's life span, it depends on personal history and genetics, and even a person who will live to be 200 might show signs of aging by age 30. Some humans never display certain signs.
This list is not exhaustive.
- New head or face hairs growing in grey or white instead of their original color.
- Facial skin softening until it begins to crease and fold under its own weight (while human facial expressions often involve wrinkling the skin, those lines are not permanent).
- Head hairs not being replaced when they fall out (earlier and more apparent in males, sometimes beginning even before adulthood).
- Loss of teeth: Humans lose some teeth and replace them before puberty, but teeth lost later in life will not grow back. Because loss of teeth makes eating difficult, it is very likely for lost teeth to be replaced artificially.
- Irregularly-shaped patches of darker skin, about .01-03 LocalAreaUnits, on some lighter-skinned humans.
- Complaints of pain in joints.
- New weakness in the sense of hearing.
- New weakness in the sense of vision, beyond what can be easily corrected with adjustment lenses.
- Weakness of memory, moreso for recent events than distant events.
- A "stooped" posture in which the neck (the support column for the head) is held at a forward angle and the shoulders are in front of the chest. Some younger humans may have this for non-aging reasons, but otherwise it is one of the last signs of aging to develop, signaling the progression of the body's inability to repair itself.
If you are only encountering humans in a work environment — on a battleship for example, as opposed to a residential or mixed-use ship or a settlement — it is likely that all the humans you meet are adults who, regardless of age, are not nearing the end of their lifespan.
#addie writes#humans are space orcs#Big Guide to Humans#human bodies#maybe by the time we're in space we'll have cured death#but maybe we will have gotten [Good Place spoilers redacted] about it instead
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okay so not to be a huge nerd but ive been getting a lot of rbs on my siphonophore post talking about how it resembles the elden beast from elden ring - and it does!! but this is also where i reveal that im a huge nerd and have considered the design of the elden beast a lot in my runs platinuming the game and my recent attempts to 100% in seamless co-op with my girlfriend :3
so, while the elden beast being a siphonophore does make thematic and design sense (especially with the idea of the law of regression in mind- all things yearn to become one, as a siphonophore is many things that are also one!) but my main theory is that the elden beast is actually a nudibranch sea slug!!
so first im just going to show a couple of photos that i think show off the design aspects particularly well :3
this one, i feel, shows off the basic shape and how it translates into the elden beast veryyyy well. additionally, the gills are taking on a very tree-like shape- a design we see in the elden beast though this species lacks numerous ceras
here we see a nudibranch with a ton of cerata- the little tentacle things on this guys body :3 though the elden beast doesn't have this many, they seem to very much line up in appearance.
this one's a stretch- but it's appearance when it flies during the elden ring attack always reminded me of these guys 🥰
my last one to show off- the hooded nudibranch. the tree like texture in the ceras and the gold nerves running through lines up exactly with the elden beast :3
So, what does this mean?
i highly, highly doubt that the design being based off of a sea slug is just a, "that looks cool" thing. so how does this line up thematically?
firstly, i find it important to mention that nudibranches are pretty much parasitic. to eat something they latch onto it and begin eating, though keeping the stinging cells of it's prey to defend itself. to this extent, this lines up with the Golden Order's takeover of the lands between - the Erdtree parasitically latching onto the Greattree, taking those who once fought for it for their own. it's important to note here that the Crucible Knights served under Godfrey while he was Elden Lord- not before, and the misbegotten (specifically the leonine ones) seem to bear connection to Radagon, insofar as one bearing the Golden Order Greatsword and knowing incantations of the Golden Order. The Erdtree ate away at it's prey, while keeping it's stingers for itself.
Secondly, the reproduction aspect. Nudibranches are simultaneously male and female- an idea that is translated into the earthly form the elden ring was stored into, the dual beings Marika and Radagon.
Additionally, nudibranches are known very well for not possessing shells, though this isn't quite true for it's larval state- many nudibranches possess shells up until adulthood- perhaps emblematic of the beast shedding the form of Marika/Radagon to fight you.
Of course like always there's probably more to this idea that I'm not picking up on, and if anyone has any further theories I'd love to hear them :3 this is just my autism brain rambling after rotating it in my head all day.
#elden ring#elden beast#marine biology#deep sea#sea creatures#aquatic life#nudibranch#im a huge nerd
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Moth of the Week
African Wild Silk Moth
Gonometa postica
The African wild silk moth is a part of the family Lasiocampidae. It was first described in 1855 by Francis Walker. It is also known as the Brandwurm in its larval stage in Afrikaans, Kweena in its pupal stage in Tshwana, and Molopo moth/mot in English and Afrikaans.
Description The female of this moth is much longer and larger than the male due to having to carry eggs. The male is about half the size of the female and much thinner.
The female has a light brown abdomen with a dark brown thorax and head. The female’s forewings are striped light brown, dark brown, and gray. The hindwings are a yellow-brown with a dark brown edge.
The male has a dark body and wings with a transparent portion of the hindwing.
Female Forewing Range: 35–42 mm (
Male Forewing Range: 21–25 mm (
Diet and Habitat Larva of this species eat Acacia erioloba, A. tortilis, A. melifera, Burkea africana, Brachystegia spp., and Prosopis glandulosa. The larva will feed from the same tree it’s entire life unless there are two many other caterpillars. When there is a large number of caterpillars, they may defoliate the whole tree and the larva must move in order to not starve.
This moth mainly inhabits savannas with many Acacia trees, especially in drier areas. These moths contribute to the Acacia environment by providing food to predators and nutrients to plants through feces. Cocoons are usually found on Acacia tees.
Mating Males detect females’ mating pheromones with their antennae. Males fly to the females because the females are weighed down by the eggs. The female contains about 200 eggs which are laid on the food plant after fertilization. Eggs hatch in about two weeks. Eggs are laid in clumps and the newly hatched caterpillars grow as a group and become more solitary with time.
Predators This moth is preyed on by parasitic wasps and flies. These insects lay their eggs on the caterpillar and feed off of its resources until the moth larva cocoons. The parasites live off the cocoon and grow to adulthood while killing the pupa. Specifically, these larva are subject to parasitism by Diptera and Hymenoptera, the most common parasitoids being Palexorista species from the Tachinidae and Goryphus species from the Ichneumonidae.[6]
To combat external predators and weather, the caterpillars build a tough cocoon. Caterpillars and their cocoons are also covered in stinging hairs to deter predators from touching them. Female cocoons are larger than male cocoons.
Fun Fact In Madagascar, wild silk has been harvested for centuries, and this knowledge has been introduced to southern Africa. The cocoons are harvested commercially in Namibia, Botswana, Kenya and South Africa, and the species also occurs in Zimbabwe and Mozambique. They are difficult to harvest due to the cocoons being covered in calcium oxalate. Oxford University discovered and patented a method known as demineralizing using a warm solution of EDTA (ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid) that soften the cocoons by dissolving the sericin. This lets the silk unravel without weakening it.
- Wild African silk moth cocoons are also used as ankle rattles in southern Africa by San and Bantu tribes. They are filled with materials such as fine gravel, seeds, glass beads, broken sea shells, or pieces of ostrich eggshell.
- Furthermore, the cocoons have long been known to cause the death of cattle, antelope and other ruminants in the Kalahari. During drought periods, the cocoons are eaten, probably because they resemble acacia pods. The silk is indigestible and blocks the rumen of multiple-stomach animals, causing starvation.
- Finally, the protein found in this species’s slik contains many basic amino acids making it a potentially useful biomaterial in cell and tissue culture.
(Source: Wikipedia, SANBI)
#libraryofmoths#animals#bugs#facts#insects#moth#lepidoptera#mothoftheweek#African wild silk moth#Gonometa postica#Lasiocampidae#double post
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Uncharismatic Fact of the Day
Paper wasps really are empire builders-- each one builds an entire colony from scratch! Once a queen matures, she leaves the nest and seeks out a suitable, unoccupied space. There, she forms a few small larval cells from chewed wood fibre, and lays her first eggs. These eggs eventually hatch into workers, which immedietly set about helping her expand the nest and gather food. From just one, a single colony can grow hold up to 200 individuals!
(Image: The beginnings of a European paper wasp’s nest (Polistes dominula) by Anton Petrus)
If you like what I do, consider leaving a tip or buying me a ko-fi!
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Last week on Wet Beast Wednesday I covered some of the biggest animals ever so this week I'm going to do a complete 180 and talk about the smallest animals in this series so far. Not so small as to be micro-animals (I'm sure I'll get to tardigrades eventually) but pretty small. Meet the hydra, a genus of freshwater cnidarians that can be found in temperate and tropical water worldwide. There's a lot of neat stuff about these tiny critters. Such as the fact that they're immortal, but we'll get to that in good time.
(image id: several hydras attached to a rock. Each hydra is a long, anrrow tube that branches at the top into 4 or more thin tentacles. They are milky-white in color. Source: Jan Hamrsky)
Hydras are visually similar to tiny anemones, but they're more closely related to siphonophores and jellyfish. Their bodies are pretty simple, consisting of a tubular body. On one end of the body is the basal disc, a simple foot that adheres to substrate. On the other end of the tube is the mouth, which leads into the gut. Ringing the mouth are tentacles that are covered in stinging cells. The gut is pretty simple and like other cnidarians, it doesn't go all the way through. That's right, when a hydra poops it comes out the same way it went in. A typical hydra consists of 50,000 to 100,000 cells and I hope for their sake that none of them are used for taste. Hydras are diploblastic, consisting of two layers of cells. For comparison, all vertebrates are triploblasts, with three cell layers. The hydra's layers are the epidermis on the outside and the gastrodermis making up the gut. Separating the layers is a gelatinous matrix called the mesoglea that functions as a hydrostatic skeleton. Hydras can contract their bodies and will do so if disturbed. When fully extended, they reach no longer than 10 mm (0.4 in). Hydras are in the cnidarian subphylum medusozoa. Other animals in this subphylum go through two stages of their lifecycle, a polyp that attaches to some substrate and a free-swimming medusa. In most, the polyp is a larval stage that will metamorphose into a medusa during maturation. Hydras instead stay as polyps their entire life. This could be a form of neoteny, the retention of juvenile traits into adulthood. Like other cnidarians, hydras are radially symmetrical. What is most impressive about hydras are their regenerative abilities.
(image id: a drawn diagram of a cross-section of a hydra with labeled anatomical features. source)
Hydras are masters of regeneration. It is this trait that earned them their name, a reference to the hydra of Greek mythology, who would grow two new heads whenever one was severed. Chop a hydra in half and each will grow into a new hydra. Chop a hydra into many pieces and you will get many hydras. Their regeneration is so impressive that if you chop one up into many cells and put them next to each other, the cells will reassemble themselves back into the original hydra. Similarly, hydras primarily reproduce asexually through budding, where one hydra will grow a new hydra out of its body. The daughter hydra will eventually split off from the parent and go on to live independently (unlike certain people I knew in high school). The daughter hydra is a genetic clone of the parent. A hydra living in good conditions can make a new clone every few days. In some species, sexual reproduction is also possible and usually only done when conditions are poor. Depending on the species, individuals can be either hermaphrodites or dioecious (either male or female). Gametes are released into the water to fertilize. Imagine if you wanted to make a baby and to do so you took a handfull of sperm or eggs and threw them all over the place, hoping that someone else also did the same thing in the right time and place. Broadcast spawning is weird.
(image ID: photos of a hydra in the process of regeneration. The hydra is green. It is cut in half, creating a head and foot end. Additional photos taken over time show each end growing into a new hydra. source)
(image id: a pale white hydra growing a bud. the bud emerges from below the head and appears as a small tube. The head of the tube is branched into 5 small nubs that will grow into tentacles. )
Hydras are predators that feed on insect larvae, tiny invertebrates, and small enough fish larvae. They use their basal discs to attach to a hard surface like a rock or branch and extend their tentacles into the water. When something brushes against the tentacle, it triggers the stinging cells. These stinging cells are called nematocysts. Each nematocyst can release what is essentially a tiny harpoon that injects neurotoxin into the target. Nematocysts fire so fast that the harpoon can experience up to 40,000 Gs of pressure. Because nematocysts are tiny, an animal that touches a tentacle will be injected with venom from many of them, getting poisoned even more as they thrash about and get tangled up. The tentacle will then transfer the prey to the mouth. Hydras can swallow pretty large prey, expanding and contracting to fit the prey animal into them. It's kind of like a snake swallowing an egg bigger than its head. While typically sessile, hydras can move around. They can slither around on their basal discs, but when they need to move fast, they summersault. When summersaulting, a hydra will reach down and grab the ground with its tentacles. It then detaches the disc and moves it to a new position. This repeats until the hydra finds itself in a good spot. A speedy hydra can move a food few inches in a day. Hydras can also secrete gas bubbles from their basal discs to float around, upside-down, in the water. A hydra will usually only move from its spot in response to pressure such as predation, competition, or lack of food.
youtube
(video: a video of a hydra capturing and eating a mosquito larva. It starts with the mosquito touching a tentacle, which adheres to and stings it. Once the larva is dead, the hydra pulls it in and gradually engulfs it. Despite the larva being larger than the hydra, the hydra can stretch its body to fully swallow the mosquito)
So about that immortality thing. Yeah, it's not just that hydras can regenerate from just about anything, they also don't age. They're kind of like Tolkien's elves in that while they won't die on their own, they can be killed. No undying lands for hydras though. As far as we know. It has been found that hydra stem cells can infinitely renew the body, preventing the effects of aging. This means that a hydra living in a place with no threats could theoretically just keep going forever. They can still die due to predation, disease, starvation, poor environment, and all the other usual suspects. We actually know the gene sequence responsible for this. I tried to read up on it, but genetics is way over my head and it literally game me a headache trying to read. Along with their longevity, hydras also have an incredible ability to repair damage to their DNA. This is important as damage or mutations in DNA accumulate with age. This is why cancer is primarily a disease of old age. As damage accumulates past the body's ability to repair it, eventually a mutation that causes cancer will come along. The longer you live, the more time this mutation has to occur. The hydra's ability to repair its DNA keeps them from all inevitably getting cancer. Naturally, scientists are hugely interested in hydra regeneration, DNA repair, and immunity to aging. If we could figure out how these things work and apply them to humans it would be huge. Expanded, perhaps even indefinite life spans with reduced effects of aging are obvious, but there are other applications. Better DNA repair could vastly reduce the chances of getting cancer or other genetic conditions while regeneration could potentially allow people to regrow limbs or organs. This is obviously still in the realm of speculation, but it's exciting to think about. In conclusion, all hail our immortal overlords, the hydras.
(image id: a hydra growing on the shell of a dead snail. The hydra is a pale yellow color and contracted, causing its midsection to bulge out. A bud is growing from one side of it. Source: Jan Hamrsky)
#wet beast wednesday#hydra#hydra animal#hydrozoan#cnidarians#biology#zoology#ecology#freshwater ecology#freshwater biology#aquatic biology#biological immortality#immortality#regeneration#not like doctor who#Youtube
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Tell me about corals magic man
oh man this ask keeps sitting here and I keep starting to write stuff out, forgetting it, then never finishing. So since I am still processing tons of coral pics from a recent field work excursion about coral (and have a day off to just CHILL at home before regular work again) this is as good a time as any.
CORAL. IT'S IMPORTANT I GUESS BUT WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT? PLANT?? ANIMAL??? OVERAMBITIOUS ROCK???
Yes. kind of. Technically just an animal is correct. Corals are animals, but they are fucking weird animals. Weird in the way that only marine invertebrates can get. I love them because they're freaks. Let me show you.
Corals are a cnidarian, which puts them in the same category as anemones and jellyfish, and when you look at an individual coral polyp you can instantly see the relationship. They are colonial animals with massive structures formed out of polyps that are all clones of each other, and all building a support structure to form the whole, called the colony. An especially cute metaphor I've heard is that each coral polyp has it's own little nook like a room in the massive home they all work to build. A layer of tissue connects polyps to each other over the colony, allowing them to share nutrients and such over the entire structure like little marine communists.
These polyps can range widely in size, and they can either be distinctly separate or all fused together, only distinguished by separate mouths. Numbers can also range from millions to a couple species that will have one or polyp mouths max. Polyps can extend out or retract into their little nook, called the calyx, and extend more when the coral is capturing prey from the water.
Lookit those cute little polyps, these guys make their own cubby for themselves!
Don't worry about what I just said about capturing prey and feeding, look at those cute little guys. Some of them are out and some are retracted, showing the little bump where they live.
Fused polyps like on brain corals don't extend exactly, but feeder tentacles will come out from that delineation between the ridge and oral groove. It's actually called an oral groove! Those tentacles are full of the same stinging cells jellyfish and anemones have! One biologist referred to brain corals as a wall of mouths! Ive seen them using those tentacles to slowly drag struggling little shrimps and larval fish towards a slowly opening mouth amongst that wall of mouths! It's like living in a place where at night, the walls open mouths and drag you into them with unthinking stinging strings! Sometimes they just spit out digestive strings to digest stuff outside of their body, like other coral that got too close and needs to check itself! Isn't that great!
A lot of people are surprised to hear "mouths" and "feeding" with corals and yup, corals are animals and therefore they eat! Each polyp has a mouth and tentacles and will extend them to capture prey, mostly zooplankton but also some plant material. Because they're fucking weird though, many species also gain energy via photosynthesis with the help of a symbiotic dinoflagellate called the zooxanthellae or symbiodinium. It's this algae like symbiont that actually gives coral most of their colors. These colors can range from psychadelic to just brown, with regular old browns and greens and yellows being the most common colors (especially in the Caribbean).
A bleached coral is still alive, but due to stress has lost their zooxanthellae. They can survive and recover, but in this state they are highly stressed, prone to disease, and can starve slowly without the symbionts helping with their nutritional needs. They appear white or faded because the loss of their symbionts reveals the white calcium skeleton beneath the tissue.
Bleached portion of coral beside unbleached.
A dead coral is one that has lost all of it's tissue, and every individual polyp has died, leaving nothing but the skeleton which can no longer grow without the living polyps. Bleached coral is very, very vulnerable to becoming a dead coral.
Unusually high heat is the most common trigger for a bleaching event. And this is where, in my education talks I sometimes do, I pause with a strained grimace of a smile as we all contemplate ocean temperatures hiking up every summer.
SO WHY ARE THESE WEIRDASS ROCK ANIMALS IMPORTANT BESIDES BEING COOL TO LOOK AT?
Coral structure can be colloquially described as stony or soft. Stony corals are what I work with more, and these guys are the ones that build a hard, calcium based structure as their support building, and these powerhouses are the ones that build the coral reef. Soft corals are what it says on the tin, they may have a sort of support structure that varies amongst families, but it's flexible (you'll see them waving very beautifully and gracefully in the currents) and they (for the most part) do not build the reef. If they do add to reef building it, it's with a very slow process of depositing fine layers.
(Soft corals of course have their role in the overall reef health, but reefs are bonkers complicated ecosystems and I'm trying to keep on track here.)
When you're looking at the reef, you are looking on centuries, if not millennia, of stony corals building on top of each other. Sometimes this building has been going on for so long that islands are made of fossilized reefs from millions of years ago, with corals that still resemble modern species in the rock. (This is the case of BonAire and blew my goddamn mind seeing the fossil reef it's so fuckin cool.)
Sometimes just a single colony will keep building on itself into massive structures. Polyp clones adding on and on to their predecessors, giving the colony overall a lifespan in centuries. It's thought that some huge colonies may be thousands of years old, because the fastest growing stony corals have a growth rate that may equal centimeters per year.
It's those reef structures of calcium carbonate building up and up that provide the homes to so many other creatures that coral reefs are some of the most biologically diverse, and biologically dense ecosystems out there, like rainforests of the ocean. Even marine life that doesn't live directly in the reefs have a connection to them, using them as feeding grounds, breeding areas, a place to hide while young and vulnerable, ect.
They even protect coastlines, acting as a literal barrier that reduces wave damage from storms or just wave action in general. The reef takes the brunt of the physical damage, colonies get knocked around, but the still living polyps keep on building and rebuilding so the reef can go on and not get smashed into rubble every year.
That is, if there are still stony corals alive to do the rebuilding. :))))))
So you have these weird animals who build stone structures like cathedrals, have algae in their tissue, live as massive ancient colonies of clones that can eat, photosynthesize, and also reproduce both asexually and sexually. They're able to branch out and do all of that because they are adapted to insanely stable environments. Temperatures don't fluctuate by more than a couple degrees seasonally, tides are consistent, storm seasons are consistent, the water is consistently clear due to lack of algae, which allows sunlight to penetrate and feed the symbionts that feed the coral. Mineral levels in the water are stable so they can take the calcium and carbonate from the sea water to build their skeletons. Without having to be able to adjust to changes in the environment they just went hog fucking wild on all the ways an animal can be an animal.
And here I once again pause with a strained grimace smile as we all take in how they need to be alive to keep building those reefs that support the ocean and the coasts, and how not stable their environment is becoming with new pollutants clouding waters, storms becoming more unpredictable, and waters having bigger temperature swings with hot summer spikes. :)))))))))))
#long post#marine biology#coral reefs#informative#corals are freaks and i love them#i barely touched how theyre freaks i wanted to keep this to a simple 101 guide on what they are and why theyre important#and why they are. not doing too great.#in the grand scheme of the world i believe coral reefs as an ecosystem type will survive#a few species are super hardy#some are more adaptable#in millions of years the ones that made it will eventually find new suitable places to rebuild on the rubble of ruins#but also i would prefer NOT HAVING A CATASTROPHIC EXTINCTION EVENT FOR THEM TO RECOVER FROM OVER A FEW MILLION YEARS THANKS#I WOULD PREFER THAT SORT OF RUIN NOT MAKING LIVES HARDER FOR EVERYONE
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This fuckass bug HAUNTS my every waking thought
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There’s a group of parasitic barnacles, the Rhizocephala, which mature in the bodies of crabs. They have a normal shrimp-like larval stage, like other barnacles, but instead of finding a rock to sit on it’ll grab hold of a crab and, before dying, inject an amorphous glob of cells called the vermigon. This glob is the beginning of the adult stage. From here it grows inside the crab as a network of root-like threads, and lives that way for the rest of its life. It’s technically still a barnacle! It has a barnacle genome and lays barnacle eggs. This makes the directionless mass of roots a crustacean. Isn’t that amazing?
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The lion's mane jellyfish (Cyanea capillata), also known as the giant jellyfish, arctic red jellyfish, or the hair jelly is a species of large jellyfish which inhabits the cold, boreal waters of the Arctic, northern Atlantic, and northern Pacific Oceans and is especially common in the English Channel, Irish Sea, North Sea, and in western Scandinavian waters. Lion's mane jellyfish remain mostly very near the surface, at no more than 66ft in depth (20m) depth. Their slow pulsations weakly drive them forward, so they depend on ocean currents to travel great distances. The jellyfish are most often spotted during the late summer and autumn, when they have grown to a large size and the currents begin to sweep them to shore. Unlike most pelagic jellyfish, they are completely solitary and rarely travel in groups. The lion's mane jellyfish uses its stinging tentacles to capture, pull in, and eat prey such as fish, zooplankton, sea creatures, and smaller jellyfish. Lion’s mane jellyfish are themselves eaten by sea birds, sunfish, other jellyfish species, and sea turtles particularly the leatherback sea turtle. Lion's mane jellyfish are named for their showy, trailing tentacles reminiscent of a lion's mane. They can vary greatly in size from a bell diameter of 20 inches (50cms) to upwards of 6.5ft (2m), with tentacles reaching up to 120ft (36.6m) in length making them amongst the longest animals on earth. They vary in coloration from orange, to tan, to red. While most jellyfish such as the moon jelly have a circular bell, the bell of the Lion's Mane is divided into eight lobes, resembling an eight-pointed star. Each lobe contains about 70 to 150 tentacles, arranged in four fairly distinct rows. Along the bell margin is a balance organ at each of the eight indentations between the lobes – the rhopalium – which helps the jellyfish orient itself. From the central mouth extend broad frilly oral arms with many stinging cells called Cnidocytes. Closer to its mouth, its total number of tentacles is around 1,200. Like other jellyfish, lion's manes are capable of both sexual reproduction in the medusa stage and asexual reproduction in the polyp stage. Lion's mane jellyfish have four different stages in their year-long lifespan: a larval stage, a polyp stage, an ephyrae stage, and the medusa stage.
#pleistocene#pleistocene pride#pliestocene pride#pliestocene#ocean#sea#lion#lion's mane jellyfish#mane#jelly#fish#jellyfish#giant jellyfish#red jellyfish#arctic#hair jelly#sea creatures#marine life#cenozoic
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Avenger/TGHW Grail Terminal Alpha/A Narrating Voice, do you know if there are any sorts of programs we can run in this space, or should we try talking to the Admin?
'A NARRATING VOICE': "Considering I'm doing this behind the Admin's back? Uh, maybe don't call her. I'm backdoor-ing this shit."
"Right, right. Good to see you too and all that. I mean, I'm being flippant, but underneath my cold, dead, sarcasm is a bit of joy. Aaanyways. Before you go stir crazy, let's get practical. Just... gimmie a second."
He rummaged around a bit... or at least it sounded like he was- it was endless darkness here- before raising a hand.
"Found it! Item get!"
"So, some of you will remember a while ago when I stole a kiss from you and then revealed that the 'affection points' were me stealing your magical energy so that I could cheat the system and jury rig a contract? Well… that special moment we shared once the Preliminary War Ended… the one that netted you all that 'Super Affection Point'…"
"…Was one last hunk of magical energy I swiped from you guys, just in case! I know, I know. Ain't I a rascal? Anyways, hyah!"
...The Super Affection Point was thrown!
The Super Affection Point has been converted into three Command Spells, and has torn an opening in the Grail War…!
"This'll be a big one. Literally, this Spirit Origin will be dense as hell. After all, you'll need firepower. If I bring you back, you really will be Interlopers to the system- and by default, everyone's enemy. Which means you'll need tough Servants to survive the onslaught, so pick. Also, maybe it'll serve as idiot-proofing. Maybe? Doubt it, but no harm in trying. I'll also just… iterate, that these options are… how would you say it… randomized? As if they were put through a (theoretical) randomizer and then given as options. Anyways, go! Pick! Now!"
'A NARRATING VOICE': "Sheesh, look at these guys. I'd hate to be on their bad side. Have you ever noticed that even the most 'Heroic' of Heroic Spirits are like, super violent?"
ARCHER
The demigod son of Poseidon, and one of Greece's greatest hunters- the man who shot down the goddess of the moon. With top-ranked parameters in almost every statistic, as a warrior his talent is unmatched. However, he tends to falter a bit when it comes to vices, easily distracted by beautiful women and constantly haunted by a lunar presence (girlfriend).
Strength: A
Endurance: A
Agility: B+
Mana: C
Luck: A
NP: EX
Starting Health: 11
Starting Mana: 7
FOREIGNER
A mysterious presence from beyond the stars-- or perhaps a refreshing wind from the cosmos. Her nature is considered 'theoretical', even as a Servant in the Solar Cell, and may be linked to an item retrieved beforehand. Despite her incredible might, she is ultimately inexperienced, both as a warrior and a Servant.
Strength: C
Endurance: C
Agility: B
Mana: EX
Luck: A
NP: B++
Starting Health: 7
Starting Mana: 13
CASTER
The Mage of Flowers. Possessing incredible magical talent, and wisdom that would be renowned for ages, this Caster is one of the defining members of his class. However, his personality does make him a bit difficult to get along with at times, as he tends to be more of a 'big picture' thinker with his own vices.
Strength: B
Endurance: E
Agility: D
Mana: A
Luck: C
NP: C
Starting Health: 5
Starting Mana: 11
-
'A NARRATING VOICE': "You know, if it was up to me, I'd say- 'if everyone'll treat you like your evil, then go all in'. Nothing wrong with getting some help from the dark side! Anyways, I now present 'Column B'!"
BEAST II
A Primordial Deity who's greatest sin is the inability to let go. Powerful, commanding, and… smothering, she is a proud Servant that considers everyone her 'children'. If she were to be summoned, the constraints of the Solar Cell would put her in a larval form. However, with enough time and mana (or the cry of the Command Spell), she could briefly attain her full might as Primordial Mother.
Strength: C
Endurance: C
Agility: D
Mana: A
Luck: EX
NP: EX
Starting Health: 7
Starting Mana: 11
(Statistics are variable based on form.)
BEAST VI/S
A bright, burning Emperor of Roses. A violent ruler that approves of avarice and depravity, and watches the incineration of the world with a confident smile on her face. Despite her more affable nature, this Beast is almost certainly 'Evil', and should therefore be treated with care. However, in another time and another place, she has stood with- and against- a fox demon.
Strength: B
Endurance: B+
Agility: A
Mana: A
Luck: D
NP: B
Starting Health: 10
Starting Mana: 11
(Statistics are variable based on form.)
BEAST OF THE PLANET
The Mage of Flowers. Possessing incredible magical talent, and wisdom that would be renowned for ages, this prospective Beast is one of the defining members of her class-- uh, déjà vu, much? However, she is also prone to acting in accordance to whatever amuses her more, meaning that despite ultimately being an invaluable ally, there will certainly be challenges.
Strength: E
Endurance: E
Agility: C+
Mana: A++
Luck: A
NP: A
Starting Health: 3
Starting Mana: 12
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Interesting Papers for Week 8, 2024
Sensory prediction error drives subconscious motor learning outside of the laboratory. Albert, S. T., Blaum, E. C., & Blustein, D. H. (2023). Journal of Neurophysiology, 130(2), 427–435.
Working memory load impairs transfer learning in human adults. Balter, L. J. T., & Raymond, J. E. (2023). Psychological Research, 87(7), 2138–2145.
Objects sharpen visual scene representations: evidence from MEG decoding. Brandman, T., & Peelen, M. V. (2023). Cerebral Cortex, 33(16), 9524–9531.
Specific patterns of neural activity in the hippocampus after massed or distributed spatial training. Centofante, E., Fralleoni, L., Lupascu, C. A., Migliore, M., Rinaldi, A., & Mele, A. (2023). Scientific Reports, 13, 13357.
Hormonal coordination of motor output and internal prediction of sensory consequences in an electric fish. Fukutomi, M., & Carlson, B. A. (2023). Current Biology, 33(16), 3350-3359.e4.
Subcortico-amygdala pathway processes innate and learned threats. Khalil, V., Faress, I., Mermet-Joret, N., Kerwin, P., Yonehara, K., & Nabavi, S. (2023). eLife, 12, e85459.
Neural mechanisms underlying uninstructed orofacial movements during reward-based learning behaviors. Li, W.-R., Nakano, T., Mizutani, K., Matsubara, T., Kawatani, M., Mukai, Y., … Yamashita, T. (2023). Current Biology, 33(16), 3436-3451.e7.
Monkeys exhibit human-like gaze biases in economic decisions. Lupkin, S. M., & McGinty, V. B. (2023). eLife, 12, e78205.
Widespread coding of navigational variables in prefrontal cortex. Maisson, D. J.-N., Cervera, R. L., Voloh, B., Conover, I., Zambre, M., Zimmermann, J., & Hayden, B. Y. (2023). Current Biology, 33(16), 3478-3488.e3.
Synaptic variance and action potential firing of cerebellar output neurons during motor learning in larval zebrafish. Najac, M., McLean, D. L., & Raman, I. M. (2023). Current Biology, 33(16), 3299-3311.e3.
Novelty and uncertainty differentially drive exploration across development. Nussenbaum, K., Martin, R. E., Maulhardt, S., Yang, Y. (Jen), Bizzell-Hatcher, G., Bhatt, N. S., … Hartley, C. A. (2023). eLife, 12, e84260.
Ants combine object affordance with latent learning to make efficient foraging decisions. Poissonnier, L.-A., Hartmann, Y., & Czaczkes, T. J. (2023). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 120(35), e2302654120.
VIP interneurons in sensory cortex encode sensory and action signals but not direct reward signals. Ramamurthy, D. L., Chen, A., Zhou, J., Park, C., Huang, P. C., Bharghavan, P., … Feldman, D. E. (2023). Current Biology, 33(16), 3398-3408.e7.
A stochastic model of hippocampal synaptic plasticity with geometrical readout of enzyme dynamics. Rodrigues, Y. E., Tigaret, C. M., Marie, H., O’Donnell, C., & Veltz, R. (2023). eLife, 12, e80152.
Sequence anticipation and spike-timing-dependent plasticity emerge from a predictive learning rule. Saponati, M., & Vinck, M. (2023). Nature Communications, 14, 4985.
Statistical inference on representational geometries. Schütt, H. H., Kipnis, A. D., Diedrichsen, J., & Kriegeskorte, N. (2023). eLife, 12, e82566.
High-resolution volumetric imaging constrains compartmental models to explore synaptic integration and temporal processing by cochlear nucleus globular bushy cells. Spirou, G. A., Kersting, M., Carr, S., Razzaq, B., Yamamoto Alves Pinto, C., Dawson, M., … Manis, P. B. (2023). eLife, 12, e83393.
Using occipital ⍺-bursts to modulate behavior in real-time. Vigué-Guix, I., & Soto-Faraco, S. (2023). Cerebral Cortex, 33(16), 9465–9477.
Octave illusion: stimulation frequencies can modulate perception. Whittom, A., Couture, F., Chauvette, L., & Sharp, A. (2023). Psychological Research, 87(7), 2183–2191.
Completeness out of incompleteness: Inferences from regularities in imperfect information ensembles. Zhu, J., Xu, H., Shi, B., Lu, Y., Chen, H., Shen, M., & Zhou, J. (2023). Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 49(9), 1203–1220.
#neuroscience#science#research#brain science#scientific publications#cognitive science#neurobiology#cognition#psychophysics#neurons#neural computation#neural networks#computational neuroscience
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