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Scientific American: Meet ‘Baseodiscus the Eldest’
Summary
Associate professor of biology Jon Allen's ribbon worm has set a record at more than 27 years old.
Full Description
When Jon Allen, an associate professor of marine biology, showed Baseodiscus (or B, as it is called for short) to his class in 2023, then undergraduate student Chloe Goodsell was surprised. She had been taking care of the anemones and urchins sharing B’s tank and didn’t even know the worm lived there. She began asking Allen questions such as how old the worm was. It turned out that neither Allen nor any other scientist knew the answer.
The inquiry prompted Allen and Goodsell to publish a paper in the Journal of Experimental Zoology estimating B’s age: at minimum, the worm is 27 years old. It’s a new record for ribbon worms; the previous record holder was three years old. “B is older than my co-author,” Allen says with a chuckle. The worm’s longevity sheds new light on what the life expectancy of ribbon worms is and how little we know about them.
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