CREEPY CRAWLY Fast facts...

The axolotl colony in the IUB Department of Biology is the only public source of axolotls in the country for research and teaching in developmental biology. Supported by the NSF since 1969, during the past year the colony shipped out 67,367 axolotl embryos, mostly to scientists throughout the United States but also to countries such as Canada, Germany and Sweden. The axolotl is a salamander with unusual genetic properties that make it well suited for research on how embryos develop into adults. The first laboratory axolotls were living specimens brought to Paris in the 1860s and given to the Jardin des Plantes. Many of the axolotls raised in laboratories today, including most of those in the IU colony, are descendants of those animals.
Related Link:
http://www.indiana.edu/~axolotl/description.html
IU's Bloomington campus maintains the "Fort Knox" of fruit flys, a collection of some 4,500 different strains of Drosophila. IU sends out some 600 shipments every week to genetic researchers around the world. FlyBase is a database of genetic and molecular data for Drosophila carried out by a consortium of scientists at Harvard, Cambridge (U.K.) and IU.
Related Link:
http://iubio.bio.indiana.edu/
The most common question asked by kids who visit the Kirkwood Observatory in Bloomington: Why is that plastic trash bag over the top of the telescope? The answer: To protect the lens from bat droppings.
Related Link:
http://www.astro.indiana.edu