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sea butterfly

noun

  1. any member of the gastropod order Pteropoda, shelled marine mollusks so called for their ability to swim using winglike extensions of the foot.


sea butterfly

noun

  1. another name for pteropod
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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Word History and Origins

Origin of sea butterfly1

First recorded in 1880–85
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Example Sentences

Research suggests that the acidity that could develop by 2100 could make it harder for oysters, clams, sea urchins and corals to build their protective shells, and it could even dissolve the shell of a pea-size creature at the base of the food chain known as a sea butterfly.

Lastly, meet the sea butterfly.

But the sea butterfly, a marine snail the size of a peppercorn, has long appeared to use winglike appendages to fly through the water.

Dr. Murphy, now a researcher at Johns Hopkins, said the sea butterfly’s motion was easier to see because insects flap their wings hundreds of times a second, while the sea butterfly has four to five wing beats a second.

Dr. Murphy built the apparatus used to study the sea butterfly for his doctoral thesis.

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Seaburysea cabbage