Results are out! The Cuban Painted Snail has won an international competition – and will now have its DNA blueprint unravelled and the key to its beauty unlocked, potentially helping to protect this iconic species from extinction. Scientists in the UK and Cuba have been campaigning for the eye-catching snail to be crowned winner of the Mollusc of the Year 2022 – an international public vote led by the Senckenberg Nature Research Society, the LOEWE Centre for Translational Biodiversity Genomics (TBG) and the Worldwide Society for Mollusc Research. Orange form of Polymita picta, Photo: Adrián González Guillén There were five finalists in the competition - three snails, one mussel and a tusk shell or scaphopod. The Painted Snail won with a staggering 10,092 votes, taking 62...
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Scientists in the UK and Cuba are urging members of the public to vote for the ‘world’s most beautiful snail’, in an international competition to unravel its DNA blueprint – thus unlocking the key to its beauty. The Cuban Painted Snails, which are only found in Eastern Cuba, are known for their eye-catching coloured shells, which come in a variety of colours, and their ‘love dart’ – a device they use to stab mating partners. They live in a wide variety of habitats, from xerophytic shrub woodland to rainforests. Red and white Polymita picta. Photo: Bernardo Reyes-Tur Cuba is home to perhaps the world’s greatest diversity of snails, but none have shells with such a range of colours and complex patterns as the Painted Snail, or Polymita picta. Sadly, this makes them appealing to col...
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