Posted 07.31.04 at 12:18 pm

Using the tip of a pair of tweezers, researcher Gordon Hendler points to the largest of a group of deepsea brittle stars in the genus Astrophiura, retrieved from the bottom of the North Pacific Ocean during the coral cruise earlier this week. Hendler thinks the large individual is an adult female, with orange ovaries visible. The dark structure in the center of each seastar is the animal's stomach. The animals are modified to hang onto rocks, with much thinner arms than other brittle stars and suction-cup-like bodies. Photo by SONYA SENKOWSKY