Who discovered the vampire squid?

This man above is a German marine biologist, named Carl Chun. He went on an expedition on 1898 deep in the subantartic seas. He searched around for five years untill 1903. In 1903 Carl discovered and named the vampire squid.

The is the creature that he first saw(pic to the right). He mistaken this creature as an octopuss due to the legs. Later on the two filaments were discovered under folds of the webs that connect the legs.

I bet you already know why he named it the vampire squid. But for those who dont know, it was because when he caught it, it was all black with red eyes and a pure white beak. just like in the picture. Plus it was spotted deep in the abyss, hence the "from hell" part.

What do you think of this? How will you go by naming this creature if you discovered it?

Why did the other families go exinct and not the Vampire Squid?

I have searched and searched for this answer but I had no luck. Then i read that the families from my last post died off in the cretaceous era, about 65 million years ago. So by looking at that era I read about the mass extinction at the end of the cretaceous era.

This mass extinction killed off many families of land animals/plants and more then half of all the marine species. This got me thinking about what might have happened to the vampire squid's relatives.

Researching more into this mass extinction I found out that the main theory on this extinction is that a large comet or asteroid has collided into the Earth. By colliding into earth it release a giant dust cloud of debris and a clay called iridium blocked out the sun, thus extremely reducing photosynthesis.

After this research, I came up with a hypothesis. Since the vampire squid lived more then 1,000m deep in the ocean and survived this extinction, I believe that it's relatives lived closer to the surface, within the epipelagic and mesopelagic zones. Since the comet/asteroid's cloud of iridium block the sun it reduced photosynthesis and oxygen levels. Squids need a certain amount of oxygen to survive.

I think that the families were highly adaptive to the high oxygen level that when it started to decrease they were not able to adapt quickly enough to this drastic change. Also, since their prey has decrease drastically, there was not enough food to feed them all.

Since the vampire squid was deep enough it wasn't effected as much as it's relatives. It was already adaptive to low oxygen levels and little prey.

Do you think that this would've been the reason why or do you think different?

"Mass Extinction-New World Encyclopedia." Info:Main Page-New World Encyclopedia. Web. 15 Apr. 2011. http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Mass_extinction#Cretaceous-Tertiary_extinction

Campbell, Neil A. Biology. 8th ed. San Francisco: Pearson Education, 2008. 522+. Print

Is there any other species like the vampire squid?

By looking at the vampire squid's taxonomy, I found out that there are four other families in the order vampyromorpha that are closely related to Vampyroteuthis infernalis.

These four families are Geopeltididae, Leptoheuthididae, Mastigophoridae, and Loligosepiidae. All of these families are extinct. What you see above is a fossil of Leptotheuthis gigas, a close relative to the vampire squid. Dirk Fuchs, the person who found this fossil, says it resembles the vampire squid by having eight thick arms and the same web to connect all the arms.

I believe that since it resembles it, Leptotheuthis gigas and it's other relatives might have the same defensive techniques. Like having the ability to turn inside-out and maybe even have bioluminescence.

What do u think?

Fuchs, Dirk. "Loligosepiina." Tree of Life Web Project. 3 May 2010. Web. 08 Apr. 2011. http://tolweb.org/Loligosepiina/140240.

Vampyroteuthis infernalis cont.

Here is the answer for last post's question. Despite it's well developed statocyst, the organ that controls balance, it is actually a fast swimmer. When Vampyroteuthis infernalis was first discovered it was said that it was a slow possibly passive predator. Until scientists saw the vampire squid in action. Besides it being able to dart from other predators, it has some other interesting defencive strategies. The main one is when it can fold itself inside-out, showing spines making it loook more, i guess you can say more dangerous. This next one is pretty cool. It uses bioluminescence to make it look like a diffrent creature. On the tip of each tentacle and on the two eyespots on the top of the mantle. The movie below will show you the vampire squid in action.