in part because a closely related group of marine invertebrates, the hemichordates, have a similar stage. It has always been something of an embarrassment, therefore, that no such larva was known ...

Its strikingly modern morphology thus reflects a very early specialization of larval stages within the crab lineage. Based on the discrepancy between the conservative and still quite primeval ...

which means they are related to other marine invertebrates like sea stars (also called starfish) and sea urchins. The larval stage of these animals is free-swimming, and the long spikes (1) that you ...

For many ocean invertebrates, the first stage of life occurs as tiny larvae in the plankton. The toughness of the planktonic larval life has caused many scientists to wax poetically, as we tend to do ...