Hello and welcome to another Fun Fact From Flora ,

Today, we are going to keep things snappy. And luckily for you, I don’t mean quick, I mean pincers.

I have decided that, to do this justice, we need to look at two different species of crustacean. One that is the speediest (spoiler alert: it’s NOT a mantis shrimp) and one that is the strongest. When I started this, I was going to tackle both in this email, but I got so overexcited by the speedy one that we will tackle the strong one another day.

I had too much fun, sorry, not sorry.

Let’s talk speeeeedy.

We are looking at a juvenile bigclaw snapping shrimp. You would expect this shrimp to be fast, given that he comes from a family of animals called the pistol shrimps. Isn’t that brilliant? PISTOL SHRIMPS. (okay — this one HAS to be a band name please can someone start band called the pistol shrimps with me???)

Side note — I just checked to see if anyone already has a band called Pistol Shrimp and this is the closest I could find. Luckily I do not feel intimidated by their success. **

This is a juvenile bigclaw snapping shrimp.

And if I had just broken the acceleration record for a repeatable body movement underwater I would probably look a whole lot more pleased with myself than this little dude does. This would be me

Well how’s 600,000 metres per second per second (and yes, there are supposed to be two per second s). THAT IS SIMILAR TO A BULLET LEAVING A GUN.

This easily beats the adults of the same species, which go about 20 times slower , and also is even speedier than the mantis shrimp.

And he’s just a tiny little crustacean. Like seriously tiny, he is a few millimetres long.

The story is phenomenal. The researchers started off filming at 50,000 frames per second , the same they would use for an adult shrimp, and the claw movement was still a total blur. The lead researcher on the team describes it beautifully. He said Wow, these guys are really cooking.

It was only when they increased the framerate to 300,000 frames per second that they were able to actually see what on earth was going on.

So the whole snap takes just 300 microseconds. For context — a blink of an eye lasts around 500 times that long.

Very few animals can reach speeds that are this fast. One exception to that is the Dracula ant (mmm seems like another ant fact is needed soon) which can shut its jaws in only 23 microseconds. BUT it is totally cheating because moving through air is easy peasy compared to moving through water.

So how do they do it? Well, these guys can do this because they have a spring-like mechanism in the larger of their two claws. Funnily their Latin genus name is Alpheus heterochaelis — hetero = different, chaelis = claw and when they say different, they ain’t lying.

Look at the CHUNKY claw. I love the sea. You really can’t make this stuff up.

Anyways, they have this spring-like mechanism, and when it is released it whips the claw closed. This creates a high-speed water jet and makes a very loud popping sound which then startles potential predators and also stuns prey.

The noise is because of the formation of a very short-lived cavitation bubble (for the science-ly minded this is where the static pressure of a liquid reduces to below the liquid’s vapour pressure, leading to the formation of small vapor-filled cavities in the liquid). Some think this is what happens when you crack your knuckles — there are these cavitation bubbles forming in the synovial fluid in your joints.

I, once more, digress.

This snap is SO FAST that is actually produces light and plasma as well.

I"m going to say that again. It is SO FAST , it produces LIGHT and PLASMA.

This process has been mimicked by researchers to create underwater plasma that reaches nearly 1,700 degrees C. This is very handy for stuff like underwater drilling used to create geothermal wells that tap into the earth’s natural heat.

And if you want to see more, there is some highly ethically questionably content on YouTube of people competing pistol shrimp against mantis shrimp I am not sure how I feel about it but 3.7 million people decided it was worth watching so if you want to here it is.

Thanks for tuning in. If you made it this far, here is your reward.

Best fishes,

Flora