Another Friday night devoted to spreading news in the world of science.
PETA is strangely silent on this one.
Tadpoles can see through eyes on their tails. Now don't go jumping to rash conclusions. No matter what you read in the headlines, these tadpoles are not mutants. Nor are they exhibiting evidence of a homozygous recessive genotype. They did not sprout eyes on their tails like Aunt Edna sprouts whiskers on her chin. These tail-eyes were put there by scientists. Yep. They are frankentadpole peepers.
Again, don't go all weepy over the article's talk of "donor" tadpoles who gave their eyes for this experiment. They were not offered releases to sign. Didn't mark a box on their driver's license with a really bad picture. Donor tadpoles are not selfless amphibians who set out to give sight to friends without, like, "I have two eyes, so I will give my fellow tadpole one. I can live with one. Get a cool eye patch and ARRGH all the live-long day. And people will think I'm selfless." Nope. Scientist removed their eyes.
Oh, perhaps you didn't read that closely. Perhaps you didn't read at all, but tried to rent the movie and ended up at a stranger's apartment elbowing their teenage daughter away from the end of the white couch where you could reach your nuts while sipping grape juice and hushing the family discussion. If that was the case, you might have missed the detail that scientists removed the eyes of normal tadpoles, and grafted eye tissue onto the tails of the test subjects.
But wait! There's more here than meets the eye! (Heh, heh! See what I did there? I said, "meets the EYE" in a story about EYES!) Scientists REMOVED the normal eyes of the tail-eye tadpoles! Took out perfectly good eyes, made their test subjects blind, and stuck eye tissue on their tails to see if they could see! And in some convoluted manner involving red light and blue light and, oh yes, electric shock...about nineteen percent of their test subject blinded tadpoles avoided that red light shocking area.
Don't go thinking that a bunch of frogs will be released with eyes on their butts. Tadpoles absorb their tails as food. So they will be eating those eyes like Andrew Zimmern, Anthony Bourdain, and Amazing Race contestants experimenting with global cuisine.
PETA? No tadpole love? I'm sure you would have something to say about soft fluffy kittens with eyes on their tails. Perhaps some animals are more equal than others.
Another instance of scientists playing God, but this just might benefit mankind some day.
ReplyDeleteI'd like eyes on my butt, then I could see where I've been.
ReplyDeleteSometimes I think these Scientists just do stuff to F*** around!
If I had eyes on my butt, perhaps I could actually SEE how big my rear end is getting and then I MIGHT stop eating fudge and Chex Mix like they're two of the major food groups...
ReplyDeleteHey, don't let them in on every teacher's secret that we have eyes on top of our heads. A student once told her mother she knew it was true because I sometimes shove my glasses up there.
ReplyDeleteStephen,
ReplyDeleteDid you know they can make limbs regenerate? With powdered pig's bladder. I saw it on the local news last week. A dude got his fingers crushed off, and now he has them back! Sure, they're not pretty, have tiny crescent nails, and look like a deformity, but HE REGREW HIS FINGERS! Like a common starfish!
http://fox2now.com/2013/02/25/fox-files-growing-new-fingers-with-medical-powder/
http://www.ksdk.com/video/1969516255001/1/Local-doctors-regenerating-human-finger-tissue
********
joeh,
And if you had a mouth there, too...you could LITERALLY talk out of your butt!
********
Sioux,
Well, I'll give you this piece of advice: close your eyes when you sit on the toilet. Not that I know from experience. But here's one I DO know from experience: closer your mouth when you clean the toilet.
********
Linda,
Such an astute observation for one so young.