Christmas tree worms

Noun

Christmas tree worm (plural Christmas tree worms)

1. A polychaete of the species Spirobranchus giganteus.
   • The two-metre-long tube worms and the smaller Pompeii worms which bathe in scalding temperatures on volcanic vents in the deep ocean, and the bristly Christmas tree worms that achieved fame in impossibly large but otherwise accurate translation to the planet Pandora in the film Avatar2012, Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings, page 88