Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. I write about biodiversity and the hidden quirks of the natural world. During a dive off the coast of Southern California in 1979, ...

Researchers found that two individuals of a type of comb jelly can fuse and become one with a shared nervous system and digestive system. It has implications for animal regeneration and immune systems ...

Armed with the ability to accept all cells as its own, comb jellies can merge with others to survive. Here’s how it works. On a quiet summer day at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, ...

Comb jellies, technically known as ctenophores, are one of the weirdest creatures on Earth. They appeared in the seas over half a billion years ago and have maintained to the present day the comb-like ...

A little more than a year ago, while biologist Kei Jokura was in Woods Hole, Mass., he routinely walked down to the water, scanning for comb jellies. "They look like a jellyfish," he says, "but ...

Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more. Late one summer ...

Primitive animals called comb jellies can fuse their bodies and nervous systems together. Comb jellies split from the ancestors of all other living animals about 700 million years ago and have ...

“While maintaining a population of M. leidyi in a seawater tank, we noticed an atypically large individual with two aboral ends [referring to the area farthest from the mouth] and two apical organs ...

The theory of evolution shows that all life stems from a single root and that we are related, more or less distantly, to every other living thing on Earth. Our closest ancestors, as Charles Darwin ...

Researchers knew something strange was afoot at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass., when they spied a ctenophore, or comb jelly—a gelatinous sea creature that resembles a ...

And now, news of a tiny, transparent creature that can pull off a stunning trick - two individuals can fuse to become one. Here's science reporter Ari Daniel. ARI DANIEL, BYLINE: A little more than a ...