Vampire Bats Have Vein (and Artery) Sensors
by Christine Dell’Amore
Vampire bats have specially evolved nerves that can sense the heat of your veins. Scientists already knew that vampire bats have snakelike pit organs in their faces that point the mammals to the juiciest parts of their prey—the veins. But it was unknown how the predators located those choice biting spots.
Now a study has shown that bats have evolved special facial nerves that can detect body temperatures as low as 89.6 deg F (32 deg C). The vampire bat is “clearly adapted in a lot of unusual ways for a very unusual lifestyle—this is one more example,” said study co-author Nicholas Ingolia, a genomics researcher at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Baltimore, Maryland…
(read more: National Geo) (photo: Bruce Dale, Nat. Geo.)
