Turritopsis nutricula (also known as Immortal Jellyfish or Lighthouse Jellyfish) is a jellyfish-like hydra belonging to the phylum Cnidaria that has the ability to turn back. Their life cycle goes from adulthood back to unicellular life and from there continues to develop.
This is the only case ever discovered of a multi-celled organism. Cells have the ability to reverse their life cycle when mating after becoming sexually mature.
Many people believe that lighthouse jellyfish have appeared since the Cretaceous period, meaning they have existed in the modern era. ocean for more than 100 million years.
Appearance and origin of “immortal jellyfish”
Lighthouse jellyfish are actually an invasive species. It originally originated in the Pacific Ocean and is believed to have invaded oceans around the world as a result of indirect human intervention through ship ballast water.
This jellyfish is shaped like a bell with a maximum diameter of only about 4 5 mm. A young individual is only 1 mm in diameter and has 8 tentacles growing evenly along the edge while adult individuals have 80-90 tentacles.
The identifying characteristics of lighthouse jellyfish are their possession of a rather thin membrane and a relatively large stomach that is bright red and cross-shaped in the cross section.
Because it is small in size and does not cause too many adverse reactions to the ecosystem, few people pay attention to the encroachment of this animal. Turritopsis jellyfish can now be found in temperate to tropical regions in all the world’s oceans.
This makes biologists worry that they could dominate the entire ocean with the ability to exist forever – as long as “they are not eaten or overcome by disease”.
Due to the immortality mechanism, no matter how much they are affected by outside influences, their number will increase rapidly. For many years we have been waiting for a silent invasion,” said Dr. Maria Pia Miglietta of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute.
The possibility of immortality < /p>
Lighthouse jellyfish is a species of the hydra class and they have 2 different development stages in their life cycle: Polyp (hydroid) stage and development stage become jellyfish.
In which adult jellyfish will lay eggs and be fertilized in water, they then retain the fertilized eggs in the female jellyfish’s body until they develop into planula larvae.
These planula larvae can swim freely like worms or float in the sea and then sink to the sea bottom to form a digestive system and reproduce asexually into polyps.
After asexual reproduction, polyps slowly develop into adult jellyfish and begin a new life cycle.
However, while most jellyfish have a relatively fixed lifespan that varies by species, usually from a few hours to a few months, the lighthouse jellyfish is the only known species comes with the ability to mass-transform cell tissues, making them considered immortal.
According to scientific documents, this is done through a process called “immortalization”. cell transformation”. In which one type of cell in the stem body can transform into another type of cell. During this process, the immortal jellyfish will be transformed into polyps in the new polyp group.
Theoretically, Turritopsis jellyfish can reverse their life cycle continuously without limit, so it can be said that they are an immortal life form and also the only species in the world. The world has such a living mechanism.
However, in reality, Turritopsis jellyfish as well as other species in the jellyfish family will face many problems that threaten their existence such as hunting or diseases. The disease is still in its plankton stage. This will cause individual jellyfish to lose the ability to metabolize polyps as well as their unique abilities.
The method of cell development during the “cell transformation” stage of the jellyfish Turritopsis nutricula has been strongly inspires scientists to change the way human stem cells work, thereby helping tissues avoid damage due to the effects of time and even avoid death.
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