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Name: Briony C
Status: other
Age: 20s
Location: N/A
Country: N/A
Date: 2001340
Question:
I have heard that the Portuguese man-of-war is actually a colony of individual polyps which perform different tasks (e.g. digestion, reproduction) and are dependent on each other for survival. What is it about the polyps that means they are classified as separate creatures within a colony rather than just different parts of the same animal?

Replies:
Each could survive on its own, if it were separated from the others. The complete interdependence that characterizes the cells of multicellular organisms has not quite developed in the cells of these beautiful creatures.

Ellen S. Mayo

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