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What Would Kids Ask?
Deep beneath Monterey Bay, California, weird worms topped
with bright red, feathery “hats” gorge themselves
at a whalebone buffet. The red-topped female worms, as long
as your pointer finger and as thick as a pencil, carry tiny
male worms inside them and use bacteria to digest whalebone.
Leonard Long, 10, of Lafayette Elementary School in Washington,
DC, and his cousin, Lania Hendrix, 12, of Bitburg, Germany,
wanted to know why. So, they called Dr. Shana K. Goffredi
of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, co-author
of a worm study that appeared 30 July 2004 in the journal
Science, published by AAAS, the nonprofit science
society.
Here’s what Dr. Goffredi
told Leonard, Lania and a moderator from AAAS:
Q: MODERATOR:
What do children around the world need to know about these
weird worms?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
The first, most important thing that children should know
about this type of research is that there are many, many unusual
animals in the ocean, still waiting to be discovered! These
particular worms are very strange because they are living
on a dead whale at the bottom of the ocean, and there aren’t
too many animals that can take advantage of that type of habitat.
Also, these worms have no mouth and no gut, so they have teamed
up with bacteria that live inside their tissues and break
food down for them. That arrangement is called “symbiosis,”
and it’s important for the functioning of many creatures
on Earth.
Q: LANIA: How
long do these worms live?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
We still don’t know exactly how long they live. We’re
using a robot-driven submersible vehicle to look at their
environment on the deep-sea floor. This underwater canyon
where the worms live is right behind where I work. We’ve
been looking at these worms for four years, so we know they
live at least that long. We expect they may live 10 to 20
years. They can only live as long as the whale bones are there
to provide food. It takes maybe 10 to 50 years before the
bones are completely decayed.
Q: LEONARD: How
often is a new species discovered?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
That’s a very good question! Worldwide, it’s hard
to say. But, here at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute,
we discover new species probably once a month. There are so
many unusual animals on the sea floor and in the “mid-water”
above the sea floor.
Q: LANIA: Do these worms only eat off whale
carcasses?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
Yes. We believe, based on their body shape or “morphology,”
that they only feed off whale carcasses. We can’t be
sure because it’s possible that they may change or evolve
as they grow up and move from place to place, to take advantage
of a new environment. But, they have roots that they use to
penetrate the bones of the whales. We think that means they
feed only on whales.
Q: LEONARD: How
much of a whale does the group of worms eat?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
Boy, that’s hard to estimate! They’re pretty hungry.
They eat quite a bit of it. But, more importantly, these worms
are responsible for the decomposition of the entire whale,
which makes more of it available to all the other animals
in the environment, too. So, they have a big job in the food
chain.
Q: LANIA: Is
it true that the male worms only survive inside the female
worms?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
Yes, that’s what we think. We know little about the
reproduction of these worms. But, we see 50 to 100 males living
inside the tube-shaped female worms. The males’ only
job is to fertilize the females’ eggs.
Q: LANIA: If
the female worm has too many males inside her, can she die?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
I’m not positive, but Mother Nature probably has designed
it so there are never too many males inside a female. There’s
probably some sort of natural competition among the males.
Also, the males are very small -- microscopic -- and the females
can be the width of a pencil. So, I don’t think the
females could die from overcrowding by males.
Q: LEONARD: Can
tube worms live anywhere other than a whale carcass?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
The whale worms are part of a group or family of worms called
“Vestimentiferans.” Their relatives can live in
other very special environments where no other animals can
live – like, under sea volcanoes, or certain areas of
Monterey Canyon, where there are chemicals seeping through
the sea floor that would kill most other creatures. These
tube worms can take advantage of those environments.
Q: LEONARD: How
many whales die each year?
A: GOFFREDI:
Some scientists have tried to estimate whale deaths, but it’s
hard to say for sure. We think it happens frequently. Lots
of whales die during migration because it’s hard on
the young ones. They travel thousands of miles, all the way
from Mexico, through Monterey Bay, to the Arctic. Many whales
may die during migration, but only in these specific corridors
where they travel. That’s where we find whale carcasses.
Q: MODERATOR:
How did it feel to discover the first-ever deep-sea worm that
eats whalebones? Did you jump up and down?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
[She laughs.] Yes, I guess, a little bit! I was part of a
team of scientists on a ship, using a robot-controlled submersible,
when we saw the first images of these bright red worms on
a whale carcass. But, we didn’t know what they were
right away. We had to take the specimens back to the lab and
work with many other scientists in Australia and other places.
As we learned more and more, sure, there were a bunch of moments
when we were excited enough to jump up and down.
Q: MODERATOR:
How did you first become interested in science, and what is
your advice to young people like Lania and Leonard?
A: DR. GOFFREDI:
I always collected bugs in my backyard, so I became interested
in backyard biology. I came from Colorado to the West Coast
of the United States and then became interested in marine
biology. If you are interested in science, you can definitely
make it a career. My job is so much fun. It’s like playing
in a sandbox, everyday. Field work -- looking at different
species in the ocean -- takes up about 20 percent of my job.
I also spend a lot of time in the laboratory, and I talk to
young people and others.
This research appeared 30 July
2004 in the journal Science, online at http://www.sciencemag.org.
Science is published by AAAS, the nonprofit science society.
(See http://www.aaas.org.)
Download a PDF
of the paper by Rouse et. al.
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
--Look for Science for Kids features
on the EurekAlert! Web site, http://www.eurekalert.org/kidsnews,
and be sure to check out EurekAlert!’s marine science
portal, too, at http://www.eurekalert.org/marinescience/.
--To listen to the National Public
Radio (NPR) report on this research, go to http://www.npr.org/features/feature.php?wfId=3806235.
--To read more on MSNBC.com, go
to
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5549064/
--Or, take a look at the Monterey
Bay Aquarium Research Institute at http://www.mbari.org/.
###
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