SpongeBob is a good neighbor!
Amplify’d from journalwatch.conservationmagazine.org
A new study could explain how vibrant coral reefs live in nutrient-poor tropical waters, or the aquatic versions of deserts. The answers, it appears, may lie in sponges.
Marine sponges line the walls of coral cavities and can filter huge amounts of water, which contains dissolved organic carbon produced by the reef’s corals and algae.
Researchers monitored a sponge species, Halisarca caerulea, in a natural coral reef environment in the Netherlands Antilles and in aquariums. They found that 46.6 percent of certain sponge cells called choanocytes were rapidly dividing and creating new cells. But the sponge was also shedding old cells as debris, keeping the organism from growing any larger. The cell turnover seen in these sponges appears to be the fastest everRead more at journalwatch.conservationmagazine.org
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celestialdancer November 17, 2009 4:07 pm
dana November 23, 2009 7:39 pm