The Mantis Shrimp

Why I love Mantis Shrimp

Those little cute rainbow and glorious looking creatures are nothing but evil killers! Yep, you read it. Bloody killers!

|| Some mindblowing facts about them:

Despite their name, mantis shrimp aren’t shrimp at all. (Neither, of course, are they mantises.) They're Stomatopods, distant relatives to crabs, shrimp, and lobsters. They are older than dinosaurs. Stomatopods began evolving independently from other crustaceans nearly 400 million years ago, about 170 million years before the first dinosaurs appeared on the scene. Mantis shrimp come in a variety of species, (about 400). They’re usually classified by murder method because of their powerful claws that they use to attack and kill the prey by spearing, stunning, or dismembering. In captivity, some larger species can break through aquarium glass with a single strike.

Dactyl clubs superpowers. They uses those two appendages called dactyl clubs, to pummel their prey. These "fists" spring from their bodies at 50 mph, accelerating quicker than a 22-caliber bullet!!. At those speeds, the water surround boil, to briefly reach the temperature of the sun’s surface, generating vapor-filled bubbles. The collapse of these bubbles produces a shock wawe that hit their prey twice! Together with the instantaneous forces of 1,500 newtons, caused by the impact of the appendage against the enemy. So, even if the initial strike misses the prey, the shock wave could be enough powerfull to stun or even kill. As if all this was not enough, the impact can also produce sonoluminescence, this will produce a very small amount of light within the collapsing bubble. Although the light is too weak and short-lived to be detected without advanced scientific equipment, the light emission has probably no biological significance but is rather a side-effect of the rapid snapping motion.

Crystal shild. You are now probably wondering...How can this little animal deliver such a deadly blow without injuring itself? They found out that the Stomatopods' shell consists of an outer coating of hydroxyapatite, a hard crystalline calcium-phosphate ceramic material. Under that: Layers of elastic polysaccharide chitin are positioned in a way to act as shock absorbers, reducing the possibility of cracks. The design is so effective that researchers modeled a new type of carbon fiber material after it with potential applications in aircraft panels and military body armor.

Eye-chatching! Lets spend 2 lines on "how the eyes works". The eyes have milions of light sentive cells, divided by:

Dogs have Two type of color-receptive cones:

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Humans have Three type of color-receptive cones:

Thanks to our third cone we are able to see all the specs that are derived from the combination of the 3 of them

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Butterflies have Five! type of color-receptive cones:

In addition to our spectrum they have 2 other unknown cones that enable them to see an infinite range of other colors that our brain is not even capable of imagine.

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Mantis shrimp have not 2, not 3, not 5... but Sixteen! type of color-receptive cones:

this is a "tribute page" made by inglobing and partially re-writing information from the web. Its an exercise for frontend developing (still work in progress). I apologise for not quoting all the part i used to build this page.