SCIENCE: Worms With Three Sexes Live in Poisonous Lake in California
Mono Lake in California contains super salty, arsenic-laced water and very few signs of life. Now, researchers have found eight worm species that thrive in the extreme ecosystem — and one of those species has three sexes, according to a new study. Mono Lake lies in the eastern Sierra Mountains and serves as habitat for brine shrimp, diving flies, bacteria and algae, but nothing else — or so scientists thought. Biologist Paul Sternberg and his colleagues at the California Institute of Technology thought that microscopic worms called nematodes might lurk in Mono Lake, partially because the wriggling creatures are considered … Read more