Oh hey hey, hey, it's your seventh grade yearbook photo.

Ali Ward, things are about to get a bit squishy and fancy around here with axolaterals.

They're more than just a gravel payday folks.

These are aquatic salamanders with feather head gills. They're demigods to some,

they're pop cultural icons to others, and they're potentially the key to your survival, no pressure.

So this is a topic I've personally wanted to explore since high school

when I had these little amphibians in my biology classroom and in my sketchbooks and we are lucky to be talking with a scientist

who not only cares for these creatures and raises them but also leads research

as a principal investigator into their odd cell biology and what it could mean for

humanity and other animals at her lab at Harvard Medical School's Department of

STEM Cell and regenerative biology.

Kind of a big deal.

So we hopped on a call from her lab to discuss all things

axelotel. But first, just a quick thank you to everyone who submitted

excellent axelotel questions for this episode,

including a lot from your children.

And we kept the adult language to a minimum for this one, but yeah, there are a few swears here

and there.

If you want 100% kids-safe safe episodes though, we have a whole show for that.

We have a brand new show and a feed for Somologies.

They are shorter classroom, all ages episodes.

Yes, you can subscribe at the link in the show notes there's a ton of

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