WEBVTT - How Do Sea Spiders Breathe Through Their Legs?

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to brain Stuff from how Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff,

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<v Speaker 1>Lauren Vogel bomb here. Unsurprisingly, a human doesn't have much

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<v Speaker 1>in common with a sea spider. Actually, no other organism

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<v Speaker 1>on Earth has much in common with one of these

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<v Speaker 1>spindle legged arthropods that look more like a tinker toy

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<v Speaker 1>experiment than a living thing. My favorite top five weird

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<v Speaker 1>things about them. Their hearts are so weak that they

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<v Speaker 1>require the digestive system to move blood around their body.

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<v Speaker 1>Most of their digestive system and their genitals are encased

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<v Speaker 1>in their delicate legs. Their males carry their young, They

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<v Speaker 1>eat by sticking their probiscus into a mushy sea creature

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<v Speaker 1>and sucking out its juices, and until recently, nobody could

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<v Speaker 1>figure out how they breathed. Strange as they may be,

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<v Speaker 1>sea spiders occupy marine habitats the world over. In deep

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<v Speaker 1>and shallow waters. They can be miniscule, with a leg

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<v Speaker 1>span of only a millimeter, but antarct sea spiders grow

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<v Speaker 1>to be unusually large, about the size of a frisbee.

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<v Speaker 1>Polar gigantism is the term that describes the way animals

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<v Speaker 1>at our planets poles tend to grow much larger than

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<v Speaker 1>in other parts of the world. Even at their biggest

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<v Speaker 1>This isn't to say that their bodies are very big.

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<v Speaker 1>Their trunks are improbably small in contrast to the sheer

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<v Speaker 1>area their legs take up. There's not a lot of

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<v Speaker 1>surface area on a sea spiders abdomen and thorax. To

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<v Speaker 1>trick it out with unnecessary amenities. A lot of jobs

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<v Speaker 1>have to be farmed out to those long, skinny legs.

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<v Speaker 1>Scientists have pretty much identified how they pack most of

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<v Speaker 1>the necessary physiological processes into such a teen c body

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<v Speaker 1>and such delicate appendages, but they haven't been able to

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<v Speaker 1>figure out how they breathe until recently. A study published

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<v Speaker 1>in a twenty eighteen issue of the Journal of Experimental

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<v Speaker 1>Biology has gotten to the bottom of how sea spiders

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<v Speaker 1>move oxygen through their bodies by studying several species of

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<v Speaker 1>giant Antarctic sea spiders. Most sea creatures have gills like

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<v Speaker 1>fish and lobsters, or lungs like ales, and some can

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<v Speaker 1>even take oxygen in through their skin. But sea spiders

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<v Speaker 1>have a tough exo skeleton and no gills or lungs,

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<v Speaker 1>so what gives The research team found sea spiders take

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<v Speaker 1>oxygen into their bodies through hundreds of tiny pores in

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<v Speaker 1>their cuticle. That's the tough outer skin that gives them

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<v Speaker 1>structure and protection. They put giant Antarctic sea spiders in

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<v Speaker 1>respiration tanks to see exactly how much oxygen they were absorbing,

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<v Speaker 1>and they found that they were taking in enough through

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<v Speaker 1>tiny holes all over their legs to run their entire bodies,

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<v Speaker 1>which of course is great for the sea spider for now,

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<v Speaker 1>but as polar seas warm as a result of global

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<v Speaker 1>climate change, their ability to absorb oxygen in this novel

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<v Speaker 1>way might be compromised. Today's episode was written by Jescelin

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<v Speaker 1>Shields and produced by Tyler Clang. For more on this

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<v Speaker 1>and lots of other precarious topics, visit our home planet,

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<v Speaker 1>how stuff Works dot com