Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (often shortened to TMNT or Ninja Turtles) are four fictional teenage anthropomorphic turtles who are named after four Renaissance Italian artists. They were trained by their anthropomorphic rat sensei in the art of ninjutsu. From their home in sewers of New York City, they battle petty criminals, evil overlords, mutated creatures, and alien invaders while attempting to remain hidden from society. They were created by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird.

The characters originated in comic books published by Mirage Studios before expanding into cartoon series, films, video games, toys, and other general merchandise. During the peak of the franchise's popularity in the late 1980s and early 1990s, it gained considerable worldwide success and fame.

History

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles first appeared in an American comic book published by Mirage Studios in 1984 in Dover, New Hampshire. The concept arose from a humorous drawing sketched out by Eastman during a casual evening of brainstorming and bad television with Laird. Using money from a tax refund, together with a loan from Eastman’s uncle, the young artists self-published a single-issue comic intended to parody four of the most popular comics of the early 1980s: Marvel Comics’ Daredevil and New Mutants, Dave Sim’s Cerebus, and Frank Miller’s Ronin. The TMNT comic series has been published in various incarnations by various comic book companies since 1984.

Turtle

Turtles are reptiles of the order Testudines (or Chelonii) characterised by a special bony or cartilaginous shell developed from their ribs and acting as a shield. "Turtle" may refer to the order as a whole (American English) or to fresh-water and sea-dwelling testudines (British English).

The order Testudines includes both extant (living) and extinct species. The earliest known members of this group date from 157 million years ago, making turtles one of the oldest reptile groups and a more ancient group than snakes or crocodilians. Of the 327 known species alive today, some are highly endangered.

Turtles are ectotherms—their internal temperature varies according to the ambient environment, commonly called cold-blooded. However, because of their high metabolic rate, leatherback sea turtles have a body temperature that is noticeably higher than that of the surrounding water.

Turtles are classified as amniotes, along with other reptiles, birds, and mammals. Like other amniotes, turtles breathe air and do not lay eggs underwater, although many species live in or around water.

Ninja

A ninja (忍者) or shinobi (忍び) was a covert agent or mercenary in feudal Japan. The functions of the ninja included: espionage, sabotage, infiltration, assassination and guerrilla warfare. Their covert methods of waging irregular warfare were deemed "dishonorable" and "beneath" the samurai-caste, who observed strict rules about honor and combat. The shinobi proper, a specially trained group of spies and mercenaries, appeared in the Sengoku or "warring states" period, in the 15th century, but antecedents may have existed in the 14th century, and possibly in the 12th century (Heian or early Kamakura era).

In the unrest of the Sengoku period (15th–17th centuries), mercenaries and spies for hire became active in the Iga Province and the adjacent area around the village of Kōga, and it is from the area's clans that much of our knowledge of the ninja is drawn. Following the unification of Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate (17th century), the ninja faded into obscurity. A number of shinobi manuals, often based on Chinese military philosophy, were written in the 17th and 18th centuries, most notably the Bansenshukai (1676).

Nickelodeon

Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick, and originally called Pinwheel) is an American basic cable and satellite television network that is owned by the Viacom Media Networks division of Viacom.

Most of its programming is aimed at children and adolescents ages 8–17, while its weekday morning edutainment programs are targeted at younger children ages 2–8. The channel's programming consists of original first-run television series, along with occasional broadcasts of released and original made-for-cable movies and select other third-party programming. Its programming runs from Sunday through Fridays from 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., and Saturdays from 7:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. (Eastern and Pacific Time).

Since July 1985, it has shared its channel space with Nick at Nite, a nighttime service that airs during the interim hours, and is treated as a separate channel from Nickelodeon by Nielsen for ratings purposes; it features reruns of older primetime sitcoms, along with some original series and feature films. Both services are sometimes collectively referred to as "Nickelodeon/Nick at Nite", due to their common association as two individual channels sharing a single channel space.

Mutant

In biology and especially genetics, a mutant is an organism or a new genetic character arising or resulting from an instance of mutation, which is a base-pair sequence change within the DNA of a gene or chromosome of an organism. The natural occurrence of genetic mutations is integral to the process of evolution. The study of mutants is an integral part of biology; by understanding the effect that a mutation in a gene has, it is possible to establish the normal function of that gene.

Mutation info

In some organisms mutants can be created by gene targeting to assess the function of any given gene. This experimental approach is called reverse genetics. For example, a collection of knockout-moss mutants can be used to identify genes with so far unknown functions.

Etymology

Although not all mutations have a noticeable phenotypic effect, the common usage of the word "mutant" is generally a pejorative term only used for noticeable mutations. Previously, people used the word "sport" (related to spurt) to refer to abnormal specimens. The scientific usage is broader, referring to any organism differing from the wild type.