1. Transparent Frog
Umm, not so fast, prof… have you seen
the “glass frog” (above), native to the Venezuelan rainforest? Like the
transparent frogs selectively bred in the lab from generations of
pale-skinned Japanese Brown Frogs, the Glass Frog’s internal organs and
eggs can be seen without too much trouble. Word to Professor Sumida:
take the grant money and run!
2. Transparent Cave Crayfish
Caves are some of the darkest places on
the planet even sophisticated light-gathering instruments are unable
to register a single photon in the deepest, darkest caves. Under these
conditions, creatures including fish, spiders, insects and crayfish have
evolved into “troglobites”: animals so precisely adapted to living in
darkness that they cannot survive outside cave environments. Under such
conditions, neither eyes nor pigmentation are necessary.
3. Transparent Sea Cucumber
Slow moving, soft bodied bottom dwellers
for the most part, Sea Cucumbers are an ancient lineage of sea
creatures who have evolved a variety of ways to survive and thrive over
hundreds of millions of years of evolution. For some Sea Cucumbers,
being transparent allows them to fly under the radar, as it were, of
predators in search of a quick & easy.
4. Transparent Icefish
Fund in the cold waters around
Antarctica and southern South America, the crocodile icefish
(Channichthyidae) feed on krill, copepods, and other fish. Their blood
is transparent because they have no hemoglobin and/or only defunct
erythrocytes. Their metabolism relies only on the oxygen dissolved in
the liquid blood, which is believed to be absorbed directly through the
skin from the water. This works because water can dissolve the most
oxygen when it is coldest.
5. Transparent Amphipod
Called Phronima, this unusual animal is
one of the many strange species recently found on an expedition to a
deep-sea mountain range in the North Atlantic. In an ironic strategy for
survival, this tiny shrimplike creature shows everything it has, inside
and out, in an attempt to disappear.
6. Transparent Squid
7. Transparent Siphonophores
Siphonophores belong to the Cnidaria, a
group of animals that includes the corals, hydroids, and true
jellyfish. Marrus orthocanna, a deep sea siphonophore. The combined
digestive and circulatory system is red; all other parts are
transparent.
