Understanding barnacle shell formation from developmental and molecular perspectives
要旨:The exploitation of light by organisms is widespread, but surprisingly little is known about the organic crystals involved in light manipulation. Organic crystals with unusually high refractive indices are components of the eyes of various animals. Guanine crystals form mirrors in the eyes of scallops, and crystals of isoxanthopterin are used both as mirrors and light scatterers in the eyes of many crustaceans. Guanine crystals are widely used to produce structural colors, such as the silvery color of fish scales. Some animals produce bright monochrome colors that are tunable. Some marine single celled protists, dinoflagellates, produce guanine crystals presumably to scatter light back into their chloroplasts to improve photosynthetic efficiency. We suspect that many more organisms produce organic crystals and that this is an emerging field in biomineralization.
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