In Nature Ecology & Evolution, a group of researchers reveal the cause of sea star wasting disease (SSWD). This discovery comes more than a decade after the start of the marine epidemic that has ...

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Before 2013, divers on North America’s west coast rarely saw purple sea urchins. The spiky animals, which are voracious kelp eaters, were a favorite food of the coast’s iconic sunflower sea stars. The ...

If you liked this story, share it with other people. Since 2013, sea star wasting disease, worsened by warming oceans, has wiped out 99% of sunflower sea stars from Washington state to Mexico, ...

The sunflower sea star (Pycnopodia helianthoides) can be found throughout intertidal and subtidal coastal waters of the northeast Pacific Ocean, from Alaska to at least northern Baja California, ...