benthic
BEN-thik
Definition
Relating to or occurring at the bottom of a body of water, such as the seafloor.
Etymology
Derived from the Greek word 'benthos', meaning 'depths of the sea'. It entered English in the late 19th century as a biological term to classify organisms living in the lowest levels of an aquatic environment.
In the news
The article uses the term to describe the lifestyle of the common octopus, contrasting its preferred bottom-dwelling movement with the limitations imposed by its specialized jet-propulsion system.
An octopus has three hearts, but during jet-propelled swimming its main systemic heart can briefly stop—the pressure inside its mantle prevents enough blood from returning to the hearts. That helps explain why bottom-dwelling octopuses usually crawl and re
Read the full article ↗ScienceBlog.com