{"id":481303,"date":"2026-02-15T09:11:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-15T09:11:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/481303\/"},"modified":"2026-02-15T09:11:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-15T09:11:07","slug":"it-might-look-like-its-dressed-in-an-inflatable-space-suit-but-this-body-armour-allows-it-to-survive-in-a-deadly-caustic-lake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/481303\/","title":{"rendered":"It might look like it&#8217;s dressed in an inflatable space suit, but this body armour allows it to survive in a deadly, caustic lake"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This fly may look as if it\u2019s dressed for a space walk, but that shimmering survival suit is designed for another, very different extreme environment. <\/p>\n<p>The alkali fly is one of only a handful of life forms that can survive the toxic waters of California\u2019s Mono Lake, which is saltier and more caustic than any ocean. <\/p>\n<p>The key to its success is an ability to dive almost entirely enclosed within a bubble of air, thanks to a hirsute, waxy, water-repellent cuticle. <\/p>\n<p>Only its eyes contact the pungent liquid, so as not to impair underwater vision. Grappling-hook claws ensure that the fly can graze on an abundance of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/plant-facts\/water-plants\/algae-facts-algae-blooms\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">algae<\/a> in the absence of predators, without bobbing straight back up to the surface. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Top image \u00a9\u00a0Alamy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This fly may look as if it\u2019s dressed for a space walk, but that shimmering survival suit is&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":481304,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[64,63,128,338],"class_list":["post-481303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=481303"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481303\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/481304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=481303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=481303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=481303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}