Their existence was confirmed during a recent survey conducted by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego and the National Geographic Society along the Sirena Deep section of the trench. They had previously only been found as deep as 6.4km, though they are prevalent on many of the ocean’s abyssal plains.
Xenophyophores are marine protozoans. They feed by sifting through sediments on the sea floor, excreting a slimy substance as they move along. With populations reaching densities of 2000 individuals in 100m2 are, the slime carpet can resemble Zerg Creep. And as these animals continually root through sediment, they tend to absorb massive quantities of lead, uranium and mercury — so no, they aren’t edible.
[NOAA - Wikipedia via Live Science]
Captain Picard
Sunday, October 23, 2011 at 10:07 AMNo doubt they will find some way to exploit them. Or their genome anyway.
Franz
Monday, October 24, 2011 at 5:47 PMGet a whole farm of them to eat depleted uranium/nuclear waste?
Pat
Sunday, October 23, 2011 at 5:25 PMJapan could do with several thousands of these.
Stephen
Sunday, October 23, 2011 at 5:47 PMAn ostrich egg is 15cm long and 13cm wide. And unfertilised, is a single cell.
John
Sunday, October 23, 2011 at 7:03 PMalthough an ostrich egg has only half of a normal cells DNA (gamete)… it is still larger and a single cell, I would have to say stephen is right, but still this is pretty cool
FrancisM
Sunday, October 23, 2011 at 10:42 PMBut not a single celled organisim..just a cell. Plus it needs the secondary cells of the shell to protect it
Sean
Monday, October 24, 2011 at 9:38 AMIt’s been a long time since I did biology, but I believe it is the germinal disk and yolk sack that is a single cell, not the entire egg.
MDG
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 12:40 AMand the single cell is only a single cell for a very short while..
Actually do Ostriches lay unfertilized eggs??
(Yep Im thinking there’s a few more cells to an egg than one, the haploid ovum is not the egg that gets laid)
Seems a waste of effort, I though only chooks were silly enough to go to all that effort for nothing (apart for us to have something for breakfast)