100 New unknown species found in Great barrier reef,Australia.

Courtesy: http://news.nationalgeographic.com

Hundreds of new marine creatures, including as many as 150 soft corals, have been discovered in three Australian reefs, scientists report.

Previously unknown shrimps, worms, scavenging crustaceans, and spectacularly colored soft corals were identified at the tropical sites during a study led by the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS).Part of the Census of Marine Life, a ten-year initiative to assess global ocean diversity, the expeditions involved systematic sampling of lesser known coral reef animals at Lizard and Heron islands on the Great Barrier Reef and Ningaloo Reef on Australia's west coast. 

The creature, which lacks the stingers of jellyfish, was among thousands of species studied at three coral reef sites--two of them along the Great Barrier--during a four-year survey led by the Australian Institute of Marine Science. 

Not even this small, delicate seaweed species,Caulerpa cupressoides, escaped the notice of scientists cataloging coral reef inhabitants near Heron Island in Australia. 

A gelatinous "creature" pictured floating in the water column off Lizard Island in northeasternAustralia is actually a colony of smaller animals called salpae. 
These sac-like filter feeders can either float as individuals or can form long chains as they drift through the ocean feeding on plankton. 

A pair of fan worms wave their feathery feeding arms to filter tiny particles from the water in a picture released in September 2008. 
Scientists spotted the worms during a recent survey of reef-dwelling species at three sites inAustralia.

A species of sea slug, or nudibranch, makes an exotic addition to the coral reefs off Heron Island on Australia's Great Barrier Reef. 

Survey teams recently snapped a variety of soft corals--so-called because they lack the hard skeletons of reef-building corals--growing near Lizard Island in Australia. 

Dark Dweller: Antarctic Jellyfish

Discovered during a 2006 Census of Marine Life expedition, this species was filmed in Antarctic waters that have been kept in darkness for thousands of years by thick ice cover.

Deepest Dweller

The deepest census survey took place more than three miles (five kilometers) down in the Sargasso Sea in the North Atlantic. There, researchers trawled up more than 500 species of microscopic animals called zooplankton. Twelve are likely to be new species.

A green-banded snapping shrimp reveals its disproportionate weaponry after being discovered inside dead coral on Australia's Great Barrier Reef. 

The Census of Marine Life's ambitious goal is to document all life in the oceans, a task made even harder by creatures that are very difficult to tell apart, such as this little isopod.

Isopod crustaceans include both rare and abundant species. For census researchers, trying to sort out which is which can be like finding needles in a haystack.

The isopod pictured above was one of these needles, found by a team surveying waters around Antarctica. The researchers documented many new isopod species from the thousands of specimens collected. Some species were represented by just a single animal.

Census of Marine Life researchers got a big surprise when they trawled up this "Jurassic shrimp."

. It belongs to a species thought to have died out some 50 million years ago.

Caught at a depth of 1,300 feet (400 meters), the new species is described as a "living fossil" by survey member Bertrand Richer de Forges, a marine biologist based in nearby Noumea, New Caledonia.

Neoglyphea neocaledonica belongs to an ancient group of crustaceans that were "well known from the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods [roughly 200 to 65 million years ago] and were supposed to be extinct," de Forges said.

This previously unknown squid was among 80,000 deep-sea organisms collected from the northern Mid-Atlantic Ridge, a chain of undersea mountains halfway between Europe and North America.

The species, dubbed Promachoteuthis sloani,was caught along with around 50 other types of squid during trawls as deep as 1.2 miles (3 kilometers) by a Census of Marine Life team. The team, from the Norwegian-led MAR-ECO program, is investigating life along the world's ocean mountain ranges.

The new species has unusually small, semi-opaque eyes and large numbers of suckers on its arms. The shape of its beak suggests the squid is a powerful chewer, MAR-ECO researchers say.

The "yeti crab," discovered on the floor of the Pacific Ocean, is so extraordinary that a new taxonomic family had to be invented for it.

Living next to hydrothermal vents at depths of 7,540 feet (2,300 meters), the blind white crustacean, named Kiwa hirsute, was also dubbed the yeti (or abominable snowman) crab because of its hairy arms, which support colonies of yellow bacteria.

Thanks to other sources also which provided these images.