This animal was caught in the eastern central Atlantic (seems to be complete) in depths between 100 and 600 meters. There was just individual of it. Can anybody identify it?
It looks like an Acanthocephalan. Is the "proboscis" armed ? It is jellylike and not so visible…
This looks benthic, but hard to be sure - how was it collected? With gelatinous stuff it often helps to photograph in seawater, if possible.
It is very similar in form to Echiurus but I have only seen this in its benthic state when the main body has a more leathery texture. It apparently swims during its breeding cycle and images on the web suggest that it adopts a more gelatinous form when doing so. I'm not conscious of any literature which describes this.
The specimen was sampled with a pelagic trawl in depth between 400 and 600 m. The sea floor was still more than 1,500 m below the net. In that area we collected also quite a lot of Pyrosoma.
This appears to be a pelagic polychaete with an everted proboscis. Identification of genus/species would likely require details of the jaws and arrangement of the setae which is not possible from the photo. Perhaps someone is familiar with the species already?
I think this is a larva of certain animals, such as polychaete or others. It may be mero-zooplankton (temporary zooplankton).
I do not know. it is not really good projection and a bit too shallow, but for me it looks like holothurian, something like Benthodytes.
It is written that juveniles of Benthodytes typica can be found 1400-3400 above bottom. if not long time in formol you can check for spicules.
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