There’s a snail in the deep sea that builds its shell out of iron sulfide. It literally armors itself with metal. Meanwhile, I get overwhelmed opening email. #science #marinelife 🐌
Comments
Log in with your Bluesky account to leave a comment
(I just skimmed the wiki on these guys, so take my answer with a grain of salt)
If I'm getting this right, the crazy shell is help the snail survive in their extreme environment - deep sea hydrothermal vents. But more specifically, their anatomy is largely about protecting the snail's in-house
bacteria. The bacteria synthesize vital nutrients from the snail's surroundings for themselves and "endosymbiotically" for Metal Snail.
Also according to wiki page, in one population of these snails, the scaly bit of their feet are magnetic!!! WHAT!!!!!!?????
Probably nothing. Just the environment that it lives in, that's what it can obtain to create it. Considering most snail eaters don't need to destroy the shell to get em out of it.
Hey if it helps, this snail would probably be overwhelmed with email too! Having to navigate a touchscreen or a keyboard & mouse/trackpad while being a snail would probably be a nightmare on its own. Then when snail friend learns about horrible emails they would @// -> @,,
nice... does it have a golden (pyrite) shell then, or does it reduce the sulfide (either would be badass of course) ?
ISTR some deep-sea folks have magnetite (iron oxide) teeth
Comments
If I'm getting this right, the crazy shell is help the snail survive in their extreme environment - deep sea hydrothermal vents. But more specifically, their anatomy is largely about protecting the snail's in-house
shell helps*
Not "is help the snail" 😅
Also according to wiki page, in one population of these snails, the scaly bit of their feet are magnetic!!! WHAT!!!!!!?????
ISTR some deep-sea folks have magnetite (iron oxide) teeth