Solar-powered salamander hooks up with green algae

摘要

Animals are weird. They ignore the abundant source of energy above their heads - the sun - and instead invest in cumbersome kit for eating and digesting food. Not so the spotted salamander (Ambystoma maculatum): its embryos use algae as batteries. We have long known that the embryos live in symbiosis with single-celled algae, Oophila ambtystomatis.