Definition: The marine benthic biome (benthic meaning 'bottom') encompasses the seafloor and includes such areas as shores, littoral or intertidal areas, marine coral reefs, and the deep seabed.
Definition: A steep-sided valley on the sea floor of the continental slope. Many submarine canyons are found as extensions to large rivers; however there are many that have no such association. Canyons cutting the continental slopes have been found at depths greater than 2 km below sea level. Many submarine canyons continue as submarine channels across continental rise areas and may extend for hundreds of kilometers.
Definition: National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution (USNM), Washington, District of Columbia, USA.\r\nNMNH and USNM both refer to the National Museum of Natural History. Collections are associated with one or the other acronym. US, the US National Herbarium, is a collection within the National Museum of Natural History. URL for main institutional website, http://www.mnh.si.edu/rc/\r\nURL for institutional specimen catalog, http://collections.mnh.si.edu/
Definition: Eye-spots which may be set into a pit to reduce the angles of light that enters, to allow the organism to deduce the angle of incoming light. Lens-like structures may be present, but stemmata, unlike lens eyes, cannot form an image, either for lack of refractive power or retinal resolution.
