Getting Help From Nature

A group of clams recently caught people ’sattention after an article was posted by ChinaScience Communication online. Although theseclams are usually regarded as nothing morethan delicious food， they work to monitor thelocal water quality in Poland.

Gruba Kaska pumping station， whichstands in the River Wisla， helps provide mil-lions of liters of water to Warsaw， the capital ofPoland. However， one particular concern forthe water quality has been heavy metals， and re-searchers sought help from nature to solve thisproblem.

Clams are sensitive to pollutants in theirenvironment as they filter water to feed on mi-croorganisms. They shut their shells immediate-ly after detecting“dangerous ”water.

Based on this， the researchers selectedeight clams at a time and recorded the naturalopening of their shells. After the clam“employ-ees ”become accustomed to the local water，they are placed in a specially designed contain-

最近，科普中国线上发表了一篇关于河蚌的文章，吸引了人们的注意。（剩余1688字）