High molecular weight genomic DNA was extracted from Komodo dragon blood cells. While little information is available regarding the molecular biology of reptile immunity, it is believed that innate immunity, which employs antimicrobial host-defense peptides including defensins and cathelicidins, plays a more prominent role in reptile immunity than it does in mammals.

They appear to be unaffected, suggesting that dragons have robust defenses against infection.

The Komodo dragon diet includes carrion, and a complex milieu of bacteria, including potentially pathogenic strains, has been detected in the saliva of wild dragons. These lizards of Southeast Asia and India are quite well camouflaged-until they spread their 'wings.'įlying dragons glide through the treetops using their colorful patagia, wing-like structures supported by their ribs, Jim McGuire a flying lizard specialist at the University of California at Berkeley, says by email.We report the sequencing, assembly and analysis of the genome of the Komodo dragon ( Varanus komodoensis), the largest extant lizard, with a focus on antimicrobial host-defense peptides. The males, in comparison, are tiny and toothless, living only long enough to mate. As she grows, her eyes recede, and she blossoms huge teeth rows of light-producing organs lining the body and a barbel, a whisker-like chin projection. In its larval stage, the female black dragonfish has eyestalks that can reach half its body length and allow her to see farther in the deep. This wicked Alien-like beauty was once an awkward teenager. “The primary predators of Komodo dragons are other Komodo dragons,” Robert Espinoza of the California State University, Northridge, says by email.īecause adults eat juveniles, very few youngsters are seen out in the open.

There is one animal brave enough to take them on. (Related: ' Komodo Dragon Kills with Venom, Researchers Find.') The 300-plus-pound Komodo dragon kills prey with a combination of nasty venom and lacerating teeth that dispatch that venom speedily into the victim's flesh. Thought to live only in the limestone caves of that region, the colorful arthropod defends itself by producing cyanide. (Related photos: ' Cyanide Millipede, Huge Spider Among New Species.')

Scientists discovered the pink dragon millipede in 2007 in the Greater Mekong region of Thailand.

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