All mollusks build their own shells, whether they live in water or on land. Creatures like snails, clams, oysters and mussels use an organ called a mantle to secrete layers of calcium carbonate, which ...

Symmetry is a feature of many plants, animals and even some molecules — like water. But that’s not the case with snails and their coiled shells. They are chiral — asymmetrical in such a way that they ...

Snails have shells the moment they're born, but it's kind of hard to tell. In fact, it's hard to even see a baby snail. Some are nearly microscopic, such as Angustopila psammion, whose adult-sized ...

A genetic spin doctor sets snail shells to swirl clockwise, new research confirms. And the twist in this story comes at the beginning — when snail embryos are just single cells. Working at the Tokyo ...