''Tiburonia'' is a genus of
jellyfish
Jellyfish and sea jellies are the informal common names given to the medusa-phase of certain gelatinous members of the subphylum Medusozoa, a major part of the phylum Cnidaria. Jellyfish are mainly free-swimming marine animals with umbrell ...
in the
family
Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Idea ...
Ulmaridae. It was reported in 2003, following the discovery of its only species yet identified, ''Tiburonia granrojo''. It was discovered by a crew from
MBARI
The Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) is a private, non-profit oceanographic research center in Moss Landing, California. MBARI was founded in 1987 by David Packard, and is primarily funded by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation ...
led by George Matsumoto.
Pieces of the medusae (bell margin and arms) were collected for morphological analysis, which eventually led to sequencing and taxonomic identification.
The discovery of this organism led to not only a new species, but a new subfamily of Ulmaridae, called Tiburoniinae.
Its genus was named ''Tiburonia'' after the
ROV the crew were using, called ''Tiburon'', meaning "shark" in Spanish. Because of this ROVs distinct maneuverability, all angles of the organisms were able to be observed, which is particularly important to the study of gelatinous
pelagic
The pelagic zone consists of the water column of the open ocean, and can be further divided into regions by depth (as illustrated on the right). The word ''pelagic'' is derived . The pelagic zone can be thought of as an imaginary cylinder or w ...
invertebrates.
Its species name was originally to be called "big ugly", but Kirsten Matsumoto, George Matsumoto's Wife, raised objections to this name, and renamed it ''granrojo'', meaning "big red" in Spanish.
''Tiburonia granrojo'' is one of the largest sea jellies and unusual in a number of ways. They live at ocean depths of and have been found across the
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contin ...
in the
Gulf of California
The Gulf of California ( es, Golfo de California), also known as the Sea of Cortés (''Mar de Cortés'') or Sea of Cortez, or less commonly as the Vermilion Sea (''Mar Bermejo''), is a marginal sea of the Pacific Ocean that separates the Baja C ...
,
Monterey Bay
Monterey Bay is a bay of the Pacific Ocean located on the coast of the U.S. state of California, south of the San Francisco Bay Area and its major city at the south of the bay, San Jose. San Francisco itself is further north along the coast, by ...
,
Hawaii
Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only state ...
and
Japan. It is very likely that these jellies are exhibiting
deep-sea gigantism. They can grow up to in diameter,
[ according to the California Academy of Sciences, and have thick fleshy 4-7 oral arms in place of the long tentacles found in most jellies. The ]