| Corals vs. snails on a tropical reef |
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Beautiful and damaging, "flamingo tongue" snails (Cyphoma gibbosum,) their orange spotted mantle tissue covering their shells, graze on the individual polyps (visible as tan dots on the coral branches) of a soft coral called the black sea rod (Plexaura homomalla), and leave white translucent egg masses behind as they consume the polyps. The corals' defense is to produce chemical weapons — toxic compounds that make them distasteful. The snail, though, possesses counter-weapons: biochemical mechanisms that detoxify the coral compounds.
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Posted: August 25, 2008
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