Unlike the world’s biggest bugs, these Partula snails are so small they look like little ants wearing a Halloween snail costume. And even though I usually hate bugs, when you miniaturize them, they look kind of cute! More »
Watch this nice snail. It slowly moves across the ocean floor — lah-di-lah-di-lah! — until it finds a sleeping fish three times its size. Does it say hello, Mr Fish, sorry to wake you up? No. It just opens its giant mouth and swallows it. More »
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I’ve never witnessed a fish tank snail move a micrometre, but as one reader’s time lapse of his snail’s afternoon will attest, these guys are workin’ it – proving again that the world really needs more joyous time lapse photography. More »
This bad-boy-in-a-shell could be used as inspiration for body armour, according to scientists. Meet the Crysomallon Squamiferum, or ‘scaly-foot gastropod’. He could end up saving your life. More »
If you thought the post office was slow, get a load of this Real Snail Mail project. Created by the aptly titled Boredom Research team for the SIGGRAPH 2008 Slow Art Exhibition, this snail mail service uses live snails to deliver your email messages via RFID chips planted on the shell. When you compose an email via their website, it will be delivered to one of three “snail agents” who wander aimlessly around a tank. If it should slither within range of a drop off point, the data will be collected wirelessly from the snail and delivered to the recipient.
Forget legs or treads or wheels, everyone, because tomorrow’s robots will traverse the earth on a thin film of slime, just like the humble snail. At least, that’s MIT associate professor Anette Hosoi’s vision of our robot future, and she has the “Robosnail” prototype to prove it. Since 2003, Hosoi and a revolving cadre of students have studied her terrarium full of more than 200 snails in an attempt to recreate their slimy way of locomotion in a robot. They’ve since got a working model together that can climb tree bark, walls, and–coming soon–perform invasive surgery procedures near you!
