comb jelly
nounEtymology From their prominent bands of cilia, and their jelly-like texture and resemblance to jellyfish.
1
A jelly-like marine animal of the phylum Ctenophora; a ctenophore.
- Comb-jellies (Ctenophoræ).1870, William Dallas, translation of Ernst Haeckel, “On the Organization of Sponges, and their Relationship to the Corals”, The Annals and Magazine of Natural History, fourth series, volume 5, page 7
- Ctenophora, the “comb jellies.”1907, Buel P. Colton, Zoölogy, Heath, part 1, page 330:
3 more examples
- After contacting the surface of a comb jelly, a larva is often moved about by the comb plates and cilia of the host, but eventually it may stick at a comparatively undisturbed spot.1976, Sears Crowell, “An Edwardsiid Larva Parasitic in Mnemiopsis”, in Coelenterate Ecology and Behavior, Plenum, →ISBN, page 249:
- Have you ever met a comb jelly, or ctenophore?2002, Olivia Judson, Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation, Metropolitan,, →ISBN, page 56:
- Roberts catalogues the other man-made threats to life in the sea: the introduction of alien species by means of ballast water, such as the warty comb jellies that took over the Black Sea [...].2012, Charles Clover, ‘Up To Our Necks’, Literary Review, number 399:
- Derived terms
- Arctic comb jelly, bloodybelly comb jelly, cigar comb jelly, creeping comb jelly, lobed comb jelly, northern comb jelly, warty comb jelly