A ‘time-traveling’ sea creature could be the key to reverse aging

A ‘time-traveling’ sea creature could be the key to reverse aging

The sea is full of amazing creatures and unsolved mysteries.

It could also be home to the answer to one of the greatest mysteries of all: how to turn back the ravages of time.

Oceanographic Magazine reports how it has been observed by the scientific community that Atlantic comb jellyfish – also known as the ‘comb jellyfish’ – have the capacity for ‘reverse development’ and ‘life cycle plasticity’. In other words, the jellyfish can age in reverse.

According to Interesting technologyresearchers in a recently published study on “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences” detail how – under stressful conditions – the comb jelly can actually return from its adult state to larval form.

“The fact that we have found a new species that uses this peculiar ‘time travel machine’ raises fascinating questions about how widespread this capacity is across the animal tree of life,” said Joan J. Soto-Angel, one of the researchers behind the study and postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Natural History and the University of Bergen.

Believe it or not, according to a press release the study showsComb jellyfish aren’t the first species to exhibit this age-defying talent: Turritopsis – also known as “the immortal jellyfish” – can also transform from an adult into a polyp.

“Witnessing them slowly transition into a typical cydippid larva, as if going back in time, was simply fascinating,” Soto-Angel added.

The press release explains that scientists want to further study such species for developmental biology and, of course, aging purposes.

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