{"id":58515,"date":"2025-08-07T12:44:23","date_gmt":"2025-08-07T07:14:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=58515"},"modified":"2025-08-07T13:25:31","modified_gmt":"2025-08-07T07:55:31","slug":"sunflower-star-fish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/sunflower-star-fish\/","title":{"rendered":"Sunflower Star Fish"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><b>Sunflower Star Fish Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Recently, scientists have found the culprit of a mysterious disease which started killing off sunflower starfish in droves \u2014 more than 5 billion are estimated to have died since 2013 is a bacterium called Vibrio pectenicida.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>About Sunflower Star Fish<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Sunflower Sea Star (Pycnopodia helianthoides) is among the <\/span><b>largest and fastest sea stars<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in the world.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Habitat: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">commonly found on various <\/span><b>substrates like mud, sand, gravel, boulders and rock<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. They are found from the intertidal <\/span><b>coastal waters <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">zone to 435 m, however, most are found no more than 120 m.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Distribution:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It lives along the vast majority of the <\/span><b>Pacific coast of North America.<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>Features of Sunflower Sea Stars<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It has a radially <\/span><b>symmetrical body and <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">has more arms than any other species, numbering between 15 and 24 (most sea stars have between 5 and 14).<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Reproduction: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There is no sexual dimorphism within these species. Fertilization is external.They <\/span><b>breed by broadcast fertilization<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> between March and July<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They have the <\/span><b>ability to regenerate its arms<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> which may detach as a means of defense when handled excessively or attacked by a predator.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A whole new sea star may form if the detached arm has a portion of the central disk included.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Food Habits: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">These species are primarily<\/span><b> carnivorous,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> feeding on mussels, sea urchins, fish, crustaceans etc.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Ecological importance:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> These <\/span><b>are opportunistic hunters<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of a wide range of marine invertebrates, and in some areas are important predators that <\/span><b>regulate surrounding ecosystems.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As a predator of sea urchins, which graze kelp, the species <\/span><b>helps keep kelp forests healthy.<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Source: <\/b><a href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/explained\/everyday-explainers\/5-billion-starfish-wasted-away-mysterious-disease-culprit-10173862\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">IE<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sunflower Starfish is one of the largest and fastest sea stars in the world, known for its numerous arms and rapid movement across the ocean floor. Read more about Sunflower Star Fish, Habitat, Scientific Name, Features, Latest News<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":58537,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[21,2061,22,23],"class_list":{"0":"post-58515","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"tag-prelims-pointers","9":"tag-sunflower-star-fish","10":"tag-upsc-current-affairs","11":"tag-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","12":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58515"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58515\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58537"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}