Among many escape strategies that animals have evolved to evade capture by their predators, autotomy is a prominent one, whereby an animal self-amputates a body part, such as a leg or a tail (see the photo), just to elude its attacker. The ease with which animals can shed their body parts depends on the anatomy of the joint that connects the said body part to their body (1). How does the animal ensure that a limb does not shed off during its regular activity yet easily and quickly detaches when it struggles to escape the grasp of a predator? On page 770 of this issue, Baban et al. (2) show that for lizards that self-amputate their tail when under threat, the hierarchical microstructure of the tail plays an important role in this balancing act.
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