All That’s Interesting.com | By Austin Harvey | August 17, 2023 | Alien-Like Creature | More Blogs
The Promachocrinus fragarius, or Antarctic strawberry feather star, sports around 20 feather-like arms for navigation and additional clawed tendrils used for crawling along the ocean floor, an alien-like creature.
Marine scientists have recently confirmed the existence of a new species of invertebrate living in the waters of Antarctica — a terrifying strawberry-like sea creature with 20 arms
Named Promachocrinus fragarius, or “Antarctic strawberry feather star,” this newly discovered sea creature’s name might be something of a shock at first glance. Surely, it doesn’t look much like a strawberry at all. But upon further inspection, the little nub at the base of its 20-something arms does indeed resemble the titular fruit.
Greg Rouse, a marine biology professor at the University of California, San Diego, co-authored the study chronicling the discovery of the Antarctic strawberry feather star. Speaking with Insider, Rouse explained that in photographs, the team removed some of the creature’s cirri — the smaller tentacle-like strings protruding from its base — to show off its strawberry-like shape.
“We’ve taken away a bunch of the cirri so you can see the parts that they’re attached to, and that’s what looks like a strawberry,” he said. Rouse added that the cirri have small claws at the end, which allow them to hold on to the bottom of the seafloor.
Fragarius is from the Latin “fragum,” meaning strawberry.
The creature’s arms, meanwhile, are much longer and feathery. As the appendages are a bit more spread out, the creature is able to move elegantly through the ocean waters.
The team from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography published their findings in the journal Invertebrate Systematics in July 2023.
Technically, the Antarctic feather star falls under the Crinoidea class, placing it in the same category as starfish, sea urchins, sand dollars, and sea cucumbers.
