ctenophore

noun

cteno·​phore ˈte-nə-ˌfȯr  ˈtē- 

: any of a phylum (Ctenophora) of marine animals superficially resembling jellyfishes but having biradial symmetry and swimming by means of eight bands of transverse ciliated plates

called also comb jelly

ctenophoran

tə-ˈnä-fə-rən 

noun or adjective

Example Sentences

Recent Examples on the Web

Venus’s girdle, a species of comb jelly, or ctenophore. —Leslie Nemo, Scientific American, 8 June 2021

This little golden fellow, a bathypelagic ctenophore or comb jelly, anchors itself to the seafloor with its tentacles. —Discover Magazine, 7 July 2010

To humans, this ctenophore is a beautiful light show. —Discover Magazine, 29 June 2010

These parasitic amphipods bore to their host’s stomach, sometimes in large enough numbers that the victim looks more like a strainer than a jellyfish or ctenophore. —Leslie Nemo, Scientific American, 8 June 2021

Mike Ford and Allen Collins spotted the ctenophore and recognized it as a new species. —Lauren M. Johnson, CNN, 28 Nov. 2020

Both papers, which employed more extensive data and more sophisticated analysis methods than the 2008 effort, support the ctenophore-first tree. —Quanta Magazine, 25 Mar. 2015

Moroz and his collaborators published a second ctenophore genome, the sea gooseberry, in Nature in 2014. —Quanta Magazine, 25 Mar. 2015

By far the most controversial of these changes was the suggestion that ctenophores should replace sponges as the earliest branch of animals. —Quanta Magazine, 25 Mar. 2015

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Word History

Etymology

ultimately from Greek kten-, kteis + pherein to carry — more at bear

First Known Use

circa 1882, in the meaning defined above