Sea slug steals DNA--and straddles the plant/animal fence.

A green sea slug appears to be part animal, part plant. It's the first critter discovered to produce the plant pigment chlorophyll.

The sneaky slugs seem to have stolen the genes that enable this skill from algae that they've eaten. With their contraband genes, the slugs can carry out photosynthesis — the process plants use to convert sunlight into energy.

"They can make their energy-containing molecules without having to eat anything," said Sidney Pierce, a biologist at the University of South Florida in Tampa.

Pierce has been studying the unique creatures, officially called Elysia chlorotica, for about 20 years. He presented his most recent findings Jan. 7 at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology in Seattle. The finding was first reported by Science News.

One of my idols when I was a little-bitty bio major (for like, half a semester before going on a "journey" of majors, but still....) was Barbara McClintock, who found out all about the transposons (oh, and was a pioneer in recombinant DNA and demostrated the role of telomeres--totally my favorite cytogeneticist!)--this is so like that! I don't want to gush, but the idea of "stealing" DNA is so interesting to think about in terms of adaptation. That they don't just steal the genes for photosynthesis, but pass them on, is really far-out. And it suggests that maybe other species might have done similar far-out things-- "stolen" the mutations that were eventually advantageous along the way.

(Also--check out that picture! The shape of the slug's body is kind of, well, leaf-like. That's a neat adaptation, too. Sometimes evolution is surprising--especially in the ways it taunts you to "Try and explain this without Darwin!" A species that didn't maximize surface area for light exposure could make little use of chloroplasts--therefore....leafiness! Elegant, no?)