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In this photo, the jellyfish Pandea rubra may have been surprised by a camera light or in a defensive state, causing it to contract its red mantle and reveal its complex muscle anatomy.

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Red Paper Lantern Jellyfish

March 2016

Like a typical jelly, the tentacles of Haliscera biglowi trail behind it as it moves, causing water flow to push small organisms into the path of the jelly’s deadly stinging grip.

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Stinging Grip

March 2016

This young Gonatus squid is still translucent, making it tricky for predators to spot it.

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Deep Sea Squid

March 2016

This female hyperiid (Phronima sedentaria), a type of marine crustacean, is surrounded by her young inside the hollowed out barrel-shaped body cavity of a salp.

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Extreme Parenting

March 2016

Aegina citrea are stealth predators that push their tentacles ahead of their body or bell as they swim through the water.

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Ocean Lemon Drop

March 2016

Bathochordaeus stygius are filter feeders closely related to sea squirts in the phylum Chordata, the same phylum to which humans belong.

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Mucus Home

March 2016

Cystisoma (a type of hyperiid crustacean) has one huge pair of eyes.

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Giant Eyes

March 2016

Corolla moves through the water by flapping a wing plate nearly twice the size of its gelatinous shell, giving it the nickname “sea butterfly”.

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Sea Butterfly

March 2016

Sea squire illustrations from Ernst Haeckel.

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Sea Squirts

June 2015

Starfish—marine invertebrates of the phylum Echinodermata—are famous for their ability to shed limbs as a means of defense and then regenerate the sacrificed part.

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Haeckel Starfish

June 2015

This 1936 blue whale specimen from the Gulf of Alaska (above: preserved in alcohol, below: CT scan) is part of a rare Smithsonian collection of whale fetuses that were collected in association with commercial whaling operations in the early to mid-20th cen

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Blue Whale Specimen

March 2015

Citizen Science Tracks Oil’s Path: When oil spills into seawater, it's hard to know where ocean currents will carry it. To map Gulf currents and improve predictions, scientists with GoMRI's GISR project are dropping biodegradable yellow driftcards throug

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Citizen Science With a Drift Card

January 2015