In the oceans of the Earth lives a mysterious 10-meter creature, which is very rarely seen by humans (photo)

The depths of the world's oceans are home to many amazing creatures that people can see only in exceptional cases. Among them, the giant jellyfish Stygiomedusa gigantea attracts special attention.

These rare deep-sea creatures have a dome about 1 meter in diameter and four tentacles that can be up to 10 meters long. Due to their size, they are among the largest marine invertebrate predators in the world and live in all oceans of the planet, except for the Arctic Ocean, Live Science reports.

Scientists discovered the first specimen of the Stygiomedusa gigantea jellyfish back in 1899, but a detailed description of this creature appeared only in 1910. Since then, giant jellyfish have been observed in the world's oceans about 120 times. This is because these invertebrate predators mostly live at depths of up to 6700 meters.

The unique ability of their bodies to shrink allows these jellyfish to withstand the extremely high pressure typical of such great depths.

Three years ago, scientists first recorded Stygiomedusa gigantea jellyfish during an expedition to Antarctica. The researchers found that these jellyfish live at a depth of 80 to 280 meters. Biologists have suggested that in Antarctic waters they can live much closer to the ocean surface, as seasonal changes in the amount of sunlight help move their prey to the upper layers of water.

Unlike most other jellyfish, Stygiomedusa gigantea does not have stinging tentacles to capture prey. Instead, they use their tentacles to wrap around their food, usually plankton or small fish, and move it to their mouths. Another unique feature of these giant jellyfish is that they are viviparous. Their babies develop inside their mother's body and later come out through her mouth.

The giant jellyfish emit a dim orange-red light due to bioluminescence, a process of creating light through natural chemical reactions. The exact reason why Stygiomedusa gigantea g low remains unknown, but scientists speculate that it may help them communicate, ward off predators, attract prey, or find mates.

Due to the fact that these jellyfish live at great depths where there is almost no sunlight, their glow remains very weak, making them particularly difficult to detect.

If you want to get the latest news about the war and events in Ukraine, subscribe to our Telegram channel!