Sea Lamprey Shows The Origins Of Brain Development
Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - 10:01
in Biology & Nature
Parasitic lamprey are a challenge to study but an important one - they are an invasive pest in the Great Lakes but difficult to study under controlled conditions because they live up to 10 years and only spawn for a few short weeks in the summer before they die. Lamprey are slimy, eel-like parasitic fish with tooth-riddled, jawless, sucking mouths, and rather disgusting to look at, but thanks to their important position on the vertebrate family tree, they can offer important insights about the evolutionary history of brain development, according to a new paper in Nature. read more