Word: newts
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Dates: during 1923-1923
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...Prof. Paul Kammerer, also of the University of Vienna, whose experiments in the transmission of acquired characteristics have recently aroused widespread interest here and in England, some biologists going so far as to rank him with Darwin (TIME, May 12). Kammerer grew eyes in the proteus, a sightless newt whose eyes are mere rudimentary spots beneath the skin, atrophied through ages of living in deep marine caves. He did it by exposing the newts to red light in their watery home continuously for five years from birth. After several generations, one group appeared with eyes that pushed through the head...
Kammerer's chief experiments have been on fire salamanders with black and yellow spots. When taken from their natural habitat to yellow soil, they gradually lost their black color, and their offspring were all yellow. Kammerer also grew eyes in the sightless newt, which requires no eyes because it lives in greenish water depths. These results have been called in question by many biologists who claim that they are not instances of true inheritance, but merely of nutritive or chemical influences on the germ cells, the possibility of which is readily admitted...
Professor Kammerer-who grew eyes on a sightless newt...