Friday Deep Sea Picture: Freaks of Crustacea

Is that a gang sign that crab is flashing? West Side ya'll!

A half-blue lobster! Its cool how the mutation only affects part of the segment. In arthropods, each half of a segment is regulated by developmental patterning genes. Much work has been done on this in Drosophila research.

For more of the crustacean freak-show,including double crusher claws and albino lobsters, visit GoodMorningGloucester a wonderful blog that journals life on the docks in Gloucester. Make sure you sign up for their RSS feed!

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Punk Lobster!

Is that a result of Hox genes in the first ?
There was a loster (H. americanus) caught locally with two claws on the one side. The right claws fixed finger (propodus) sprouted an entire second claw structure opposite to the movable finger (dactyl). It was much smaller and a mirror image of the normal claw with the plane of the mirror through the fixed claw. In essence it had a second smaller movable finger below the main claw structure. Weird and cool at the same time.