Most animals have brains or simple versions called ganglia to control processes in the body. But surprisingly, jellyfish do not have such a centralized nerve center. According to Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) Nature, jellyfish have two nervous systems in which one is a large nerve net that controls swimming while the other is a small nerve net that controls feeding, spasm response, and other behaviors.
Their body-wide network of small nerve nets makes it possible for them to figure out the location of their body parts. Due to their unique nervous systems, they have been the subject of several studies. Now, scientists are studying it to gain insights into how human minds work.
Glowing Neurons: Genetically Modified Jellyfish Gives Light on How Human Minds Work
Lighting Up Neurons of Jellyfish
Many of the scientific discoveries of the human brain came from the understanding of how the brains of marine invertebrates work. For instance, scientists gained insights into how memory works by observing the sea slug called Aplysia californicus. Also, scientists have studied squids, horseshoe crabs, and octopuses to know other workings of the human mind.
The recent study titled "A Genetically Tractable Jellyfish Model for Systems and Evolutionary Neuroscience" published in Cell brings another animal to the list as scientists genetically modified jellyfish to make its neurons glow when they fire to understand the inner workings of the human mind.
Wired reported that the team experimented on the Mediterranean jellyfish species called Clytia hemisphaerica, which is the perfect candidate because of its anatomy. The jellyfish is about one centimeter wide when full-grown, which perfectly fits on a microscope slide and has a transparent body like many jellyfish.
They inserted a snippet of DNA called GCaMP into fertilized eggs that creates the green fluorescent protein to take advantage of the unique life cycle of the jellyfish. After acquiring a creature that glows under a microscope as it eats and folds its body, they observed them under the microscope and were awed at the uniqueness of their anatomy.
Scientists Identified Subnetwork of Neurons Responsible for Specific Functions
According to SciTech Daily, the team was able to examine the glowing chain reaction in the neurons of the jellyfish as they ate. The team identified the subnetwork of neurons that produced the neuropeptide, a molecule responsible for telling them where their body parts are.
Furthermore, the experiments revealed that the seemingly diffused neurons underlying the circular jellyfish umbrella are subdivided into patches of neurons that are organized like the slices of a pizza. So when they eat, the "pizza slice" nearest to the tentacle gets activated first and causes that part to fold inward and bring the food towards the mouth.
Scientists noted that this mechanism is invisible when studying the anatomy of the jellyfish without the glowing genes, even with the help of a microscope. They also emphasized that the study only scratched the surface of the full repertoire of jellyfish behavior and recommended that future scientists also study the context of how the tentacles, umbrella, and mouth of the jellyfish coordinate with each other.
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