The Incredible Secret Lives of Sea Lilies and Feather Stars

Prepare to be wowed, things are about to get weird (in a wonderful way).

Beneath the surface of the sea is a world so vast that its mysteries are only slowly revealed to us … and when they are, they are often strange and beautiful beyond what we could previously imagine.

Take the crinoids. These members of the echinoderm family are related to sea stars and sea urchins but are far less famous. There are around 600 living species of these marine invertebrates, all marked by the same basic five-sided symmetry of their cousins—though they often have multiple arms that make the initial five sides hard to distinguish.

Prepare to be wowed, things are about to get weird (in a wonderful way).

Beneath the surface of the sea is a world so vast that its mysteries are only slowly revealed to us … and when they are, they are often strange and beautiful beyond what we could previously imagine.

Take the crinoids. These members of the echinoderm family are related to sea stars and sea urchins but are far less famous. There are around 600 living species of these marine invertebrates, all marked by the same basic five-sided symmetry of their cousins—though they often have multiple arms that make the initial five sides hard to distinguish.