Chinese researchers recently reported on venomous toxins of the giant jellyfish. They revealed that this aquatic creature mixes a “cocktail” of toxins to produce stinging agony and sometimes death unto its victims.1,2
Not that we needed another reminder that Earth is fallen. Yet even ocean-faring animals, including jellyfish, are impacted by the Edenic curse.
Sorting out potent poisons is not for novices! The Chinese research team showed that the giant jellyfish’s venomous nematocysts (stinging cells) blend their lethal ingredients to cause hemolysis and other harms to their victims. They use blends that sometimes match ingredients used by non-aquatic venomous predators.
This is not the first study of the “role of the enzymatic toxins in jellyfish venom cocktails.”3 But this study has shown how the complex mixing of lethal toxins has variability traits that were previously undocumented.1,2
These coast-menacing jellyfish are called “giant” for a reason—they are huge!4
Vicious! These seacoast-lurking monsters have tentacles that are killing humans in growing numbers.
So the jellyfish venom mixtures now threaten, injure, and kill people swimming in coastal ocean-waters.6
But there’s more.
Making a complex investigation even more complicated, the composition of the giant jellyfish’s venom blend varies with age, apparently due to how the jellyfish’s diet changes with its developmental life stages. This phenomenon of age-based venom composition also occurs with some deadly cubozoan jellyfish and sea anemone.5
So, this summer, if giant jellyfish join you for a swim at the beach, you are in the wrong neighborhood!
It will be so good when the Lord returns to His creation—when He transforms the world of nature, so that jellyfish (and other predators) no longer are harmful!7
At that time, it will be much easier to appreciate the biological magnificence of these water-filled tentacle-streaming coelenterates. Even now, their bodies actually demonstrate astounding bioengineering—that only God could have understood, designed, and built into their anatomies and physiologies.8
For example, jellyfish have amazing underwater wide-vision eyesight that in some respects is similar to human eyesight.
The original jellyfish were created as “good” creatures on Day 5 of Creation Week,10 but they are now tainted with the Edenic curse.
So until they are tamed and detoxed by their Creator, watch out!
References
1. Li, R., H. Yu, T. Li, et al. 2020. Comprehensive Proteome Reveals the Key Lethal Toxins in the Venom of Jellyfish Nemopilema nomurai. Journal of Proteome Research. 19(6): 2491-2500.
2. Staff writer. 2020. What Makes a Giant Jellyfish’s Sting Deadly? American Chemical Society. Posted on acs.org June 10, 2020, accessed June 12, 2020.
3. Yue, Y., H. Yu, R. Li, et al. 2017. Functional Elucidation of Nemopilema normurai and Cyanea nozakii Nematocyst Venoms’ Lytic Activity Using Mass Spectrometry and Zymography. Toxins. 9(2):47.
4. Yet the Giant Jellyfish has a more gigantic distant cnidarian “cousin”, the Lion’s Mane Jellyfish (Cyanea capillata), the largest of all – sometimes growing its “mane” of tentacles to distances matching or exceeding the length of blue whales! See Savage, S. 2018. Lion’s Mane Jellyfish. RedOrbit (June 18, 2009; edited April 17, 2018).
5. Yue, Y., H. Yu, R. Li, et al. 2019. Insights into Individual Variations in Nematocyst Venoms from the Giant Jellyfish Nemopilema nomurai in the Yellow Sea. Scientific Reports. 9(1): 3361.
6. “Jellies (commonly termed ‘jellyfish’) of the phylum Cnidaria (ni-dah'-ree-ah), class Scyphozoa, are amazing creatures composed of 96% water. … The case for [their] design is "clearly seen" (Romans 1:20) throughout the cnidaria (e.g., jellies having two peculiar interconnected nerve nets and a hydrostatic skeleton). This includes a tiny lethal device called the cnidocyte that contains a nematocyst—a stinging, container-like structure. … The sea wasp (class Cubozoa) off the Australian coast has complex eyes and is one of the deadliest creatures on earth. The venom of a single sea wasp is more potent than a cobra's, and can kill over 50 people.” Sherwin, F. 2005. PB & J (Painful Blisters and Jellies). Acts & Facts. 34(10).
7. The original goodness of animals created on Day 5 (Genesis 1:21), as well as those created on Day 6 (Genesis 1:25), will somehow be restored in God’s future restoration/renovation of earth. See Isaiah 11:6-9, 65:17, 65:25; Ezekiel 34:25; Hosea 2:18, yet without the wild “sea” (Revelation 21:1-4).
8. See also Bruce, H. B. 2012. Four for One, One for All. Answers in Genesis. Posted on answersingenesis.org January 1, 2012, accessed June 12, 2020.
9. Sherwin, F. 2007. The Eyes of Creation. Acts & Facts. 36(7).
10. Sherwin, F. 2008. Jellyfish Reveal the Recent Hand of the Creator. Act & Facts. 37(12): 14.
*Dr. Johnson is Associate Professor of Apologetics and Chief Academic Officer at the Institute for Creation Research.