Tunicate facts: no backbone here | Animal Fact Files

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  • เผยแพร่เมื่อ 1 ต.ค. 2020
  • Although tunicates might look like they would be more closely related to a sponge, they're actually more closely related to animals with backbones! This is because in their larval stage, tunicates actually have the beginnings of a backbone, called a notochord, though this is lost in most species as they metamorphose into adults. Still, that means something that looks a lot like a sponge is actually more closely related to humans than sponges! The largest group of tunicates are more commonly known as sea squirts because they can squirt sea water from their bodies when removed from water. Other tunicates have adapted this ability for means of jet propulsion and actually move around throughout the ocean!
    Scientific Name: Subphylum - Tunicata (or Urochordata)
    Range: marine sea throughout the world (polar to tropics)
    Size: under and inch (2.54cm) to more than six feet (1.8m)
    Diet: plankton, algae
    Lifespan: about a year as adults
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    Image and Video Credits:
    Museums Victoria - • Ascidian (tunicate), H... ; • Ascidian (tunicate), B...
    ProfessorRamey - • Pelagic Tunicate Thety...
    stevenson_john - www.flickr.com/photos/stevens...
    Ed Bierman - www.flickr.com/photos/edbierm...
    prilifish - www.flickr.com/photos/silkeba...
    Bernard DUPONT - www.flickr.com/photos/bernied... www.flickr.com/photos/bernied...
    TheHALabs - • salps
    RedEnsign - commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
    OIST - vimeo.com/286292867
    Melies+CC - vimeo.com/278549523
    Diver Jackie - vimeo.com/22505767
    seawildearth - vimeo.com/56833082
    Gregory S. Sanders - vimeo.com/258575946
    Nudibranch Marine Discovery Productions (Peter van Rodijnen); Stichting Natuurbeelden - www.openbeelden.nl/media/808151; www.openbeelden.nl/media/806999; www.openbeelden.nl/media/809473
    Learning by action (producent);Klaudie Bartelink (camera);Stichting Natuurbeelden - openbeelden.nl/media/983161
    Research Credits:
    www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRp...
    www.mesa.edu.au/tunicates
    www.sciencedirect.com/topics/...
    www.sciencedirect.com/science...
    marinelab.fsu.edu/archive/vir...
    www.britannica.com/animal/tun...
    • Tunicate Development -...
    • Vertebrates 3- Tunicates
    • Incredibly Beautiful T...
    • Tunicate Facts!
    • Lecture 3 Our Ancestry...

ความคิดเห็น • 73

  • @turnstilerockets
    @turnstilerockets 3 ปีที่แล้ว +41

    Me to tunicate: "You and I are very much alike!"
    Tunicate to me: **Squirts water at**

  • @paulgirtu2463
    @paulgirtu2463 3 ปีที่แล้ว +39

    It's so weird to think that we're closer related to tunicates than we are to lancelets, even though, like us, lancelets spend the entirety of their life with a notochord and don't reproduce by budding. It's almost like mother nature made the lancelets, turned them into less complex tunicates, then decided "Nah, screw that, let's go back to the lancelet bodyplan again."

    • @saanaa8031
      @saanaa8031 11 หลายเดือนก่อน

      Allah made The universe🩵☪️

    • @hulick6910
      @hulick6910 9 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

      Probably why tunicates are related to us more than lancelets is because they are in the group olfactores, which means they have otherwise rudimentary nostrils.

    • @gaburieruR
      @gaburieruR 7 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

      More like the chordata common ancestor tried to simplify it's body, but the lack of locomotion wasn't good for survival, so mobility "came back". It's funny how a complex sponge-like creature was able to survive so long and diverse.

    • @paulgirtu2463
      @paulgirtu2463 6 หลายเดือนก่อน

      @@gaburieruR @hulick6910 is right. Turns out that our ancestor was probably very much a mobile olfactoran, and looked almost exactly like a lancelet, but with the added ability to sniff better.
      So in order to understand our evolution: at first there were the chordates. Then they split into lancelets, who conserved many basal characteristics to this day; and into olfactorans, who initially looked much like the lancelets, but evolved to have vastly different appearances, evoilving into tunicates as they became sessile, or into modern fish as they developed more complex organs. I mean, hagfish and the larvae of lampreys do resemble lancelets quite a bit. It's the tunicates who went the weird route.

    • @HYDROCARBON_XD
      @HYDROCARBON_XD 5 หลายเดือนก่อน

      Tunicates aren’t ancestors of us more like cousins,probably our ancestor and of tunicates looked like a lancelet but with a well developed olfactory system and without the horrific asymmetry cephalochordates developed for some reason,then some decided to go sessile and lose most of their cartilage and organs and the other ones continued to evolve a true skeleton and more complex organs,that’s vertebrates and urochordates

  • @HYDROCARBON_XD
    @HYDROCARBON_XD 3 ปีที่แล้ว +12

    The notochord is made of cartilage,so,it’s like a backbone-like structure

    • @MB32904
      @MB32904 ปีที่แล้ว +3

      the vertebral column is a notochord

  • @aeong_bread
    @aeong_bread 3 ปีที่แล้ว +12

    never heard of them!! they’re so weird lol, cool video :)

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  3 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      They're pretty awesome! Glad you enjoyed the video! 😊

  • @FACELESS_VOID_00
    @FACELESS_VOID_00 3 ปีที่แล้ว +8

    Don't you mean *"TunaCAT?"*

  • @willowdelosrios4326
    @willowdelosrios4326 ปีที่แล้ว +4

    It’s interesting that the description of a tunicate is eerily similar to the Elder Things from H.P. Lovecraft’s *At The Mountains of Madness*. Weirdly plant-like tissue? Check, Barrel-shaped bodies? Check. Able to live underwater? Check. Even the timeline matches up, since IIRC, the Elder Things were implied to be responsible for the Cambrian explosion, and the rise of complex organisms. Of course, tunicates aren’t capable of self-powered interstellar flight, aren’t immensely intelligent sentient beings, and as far as I know, didn’t build a immense city in Antarctica millions of years ago, or have their civilization destroyed by bio-engineered servants that developed sentience. At least I hope so; the implication of one of Lovecrafts stories turning out to be based in reality would be…troubling, to say the least.

  • @jadenl629
    @jadenl629 ปีที่แล้ว +5

    These sea creatures are fascinating!🤩 Great video and keep up the awesome work AFF!🥰

  • @Col28
    @Col28 3 ปีที่แล้ว +5

    I didn't know anything about these guys until your video. Pretty cool animals!
    Thanks!

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      Glad you learned something entirely new! 💚

  • @fffffeeeee
    @fffffeeeee 2 ปีที่แล้ว +5

    DID I ALREADY SAY I LOVE THIS CHANNEL?

  • @Y.M...
    @Y.M... 3 ปีที่แล้ว +6

    never heard of them before, thanks for this! fascinating

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  3 ปีที่แล้ว

      So glad you learned something new 😊

  • @willwhittenberg9290
    @willwhittenberg9290 3 ปีที่แล้ว +3

    Thanks so much for taking my suggestion :D !!!!

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  3 ปีที่แล้ว +3

      Thanks for making it! We had a blast making this episode and learned so much!! 💜

  • @elizabethsilverstein4901
    @elizabethsilverstein4901 3 ปีที่แล้ว +6

    I love scuba diving and see these all the time but I never knew all of these facts! Wow! I will never see them the same! They are so complex!

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  3 ปีที่แล้ว

      So glad you learned something new! It must be so much fun to see them in their natural habitat!

  • @belindaaskew
    @belindaaskew 2 ปีที่แล้ว

    Amazing! Thank you

  • @aetherslugstar1889
    @aetherslugstar1889 3 ปีที่แล้ว +4

    Im working on a speculative zoology project. I decided the flora evolved from simple animals and one group's ancestors were basically colonial tunicates

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  3 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      That sounds awesome! Best of luck in your studies!!

  • @geefreck
    @geefreck 9 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    Fun fact, Tunicates are more closely related to John Cena than to Jellyfish

  • @Spellweaver5
    @Spellweaver5 ปีที่แล้ว +11

    They are something of a body horror. Just think of it. Those creatures, when in larval stage, are basically fish. And then they get reduced to those pathetic things that are probably dumber than jellyfishes.

    • @gaburieruR
      @gaburieruR 7 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

      Dumb as rocks. On the good side, they can't be sad without a nervous system :)

    • @HYDROCARBON_XD
      @HYDROCARBON_XD 5 หลายเดือนก่อน

      Bro i just thought of it

  • @CosmicRabbitCarma
    @CosmicRabbitCarma ปีที่แล้ว +1

    One could call a tunicate Cecil because they are sessile.

  • @tomkatt8274
    @tomkatt8274 ปีที่แล้ว

    truly alien. we are slo related to insects, arachnids, crustaceans, myriapods, arthropods, mollusks, worms and sponges, but further, but still related

  • @VelociraptorAnimations
    @VelociraptorAnimations 10 หลายเดือนก่อน

    I don't like knowing that I'm closer related to some little see-through pipe than I am to an octopus. Still, these animals are quite interesting.

  • @DJLucas-xv7oe
    @DJLucas-xv7oe 2 หลายเดือนก่อน

    I thought the colored line in their body was their notochord.

  • @misoginainternalizadaopres7131
    @misoginainternalizadaopres7131 3 ปีที่แล้ว

    Sea squirts are sooo beautiful

  • @TheBluePhoenix008
    @TheBluePhoenix008 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Do you guys only do videos on real organisms or even mythical creatures?

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  3 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      We have aspirations to branch out from living real animals. Maybe one day!

    • @TheBluePhoenix008
      @TheBluePhoenix008 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@AnimalFactFiles 😁

  • @scallis2069
    @scallis2069 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Can u please talk about the ghost bat for october

    • @scallis2069
      @scallis2069 3 ปีที่แล้ว

      @FACTS AND CARTOON if that is an opshin sure

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      All of our October episodes are already made, but we'll definitely get this on the list for a future video! Thanks for watching 💜

    • @scallis2069
      @scallis2069 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      Thank you animal fact files

  • @Mr-.Facts.
    @Mr-.Facts. 3 ปีที่แล้ว +3

    Amazing animal fact: Some birds can sleep while flying!

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  3 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      True! Frigatebirds are an example of this - though, like orcas they only sleep with one side of their brain. There's more information in this article: www.audubon.org/news/scientists-finally-have-evidence-frigatebirds-sleep-while-flying

    • @Mr-.Facts.
      @Mr-.Facts. 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@AnimalFactFiles and horses sleep standing😴

    • @scallis2069
      @scallis2069 3 ปีที่แล้ว

      Wow

    • @Mr-.Facts.
      @Mr-.Facts. 3 ปีที่แล้ว

      @@scallis2069 Glad you enjoyed this informational conversation

    • @scallis2069
      @scallis2069 3 ปีที่แล้ว

      @@Mr-.Facts. I like to learn more about animals

  • @comradeweismann6947
    @comradeweismann6947 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Comments for the Algorithm

  • @tomarune
    @tomarune 3 ปีที่แล้ว

    Parana plant in water

  • @roseivee4942
    @roseivee4942 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Sis playing ka akin show ko proof

  • @demanso1
    @demanso1 5 หลายเดือนก่อน

    0:31 😢I miss my ex

  • @orsonzedd
    @orsonzedd หลายเดือนก่อน

    What the fuck do you mean even us if they're closely related to our cats they obviously have to be closely related to us

  • @Kammerliteratur
    @Kammerliteratur ปีที่แล้ว +1

    0:44 This isn't the picture of the larva of a tunicate. This is an adult Tunicate belonging to the class Appendicularia. Please fact check your graphics.

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  ปีที่แล้ว +1

      Thanks for pointing this out! Could you explain your reasoning so we don't make future mistakes?

    • @Kammerliteratur
      @Kammerliteratur ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@AnimalFactFiles I simply recognized the picture from my first semestre in biology. It is the textbook example for class Appendicularia. You can also find this specific image on the wikipedia article about class Appendicularia. To be fair, there is a lot of neoteny going on in class Appendicularia (which sometimes is also called Larvacea), the adults have a paedomorphic form that looks a lot like the larval state of other tunicates. But to show this picture while speaking about the larval stage of Tunicates is like showing a picture of an Axolotl while talking about tadpoles.

    • @Kammerliteratur
      @Kammerliteratur ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@AnimalFactFiles en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larvacea

    • @AnimalFactFiles
      @AnimalFactFiles  ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@Kammerliteratur Thanks so much for the explanation! We'll keep an eye for that in the future 😺