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Venus flytrap

A Venus flytrap (Dionaea muscipula) displays its distinctive trap with three trigger hairs on each lobe, set against a black background.

Dionaea muscipula, a carnivorous plant native to a small region of coastal North and South Carolina. Each leaf forms a hinged trap with three trigger hairs on each lobe; two touches within roughly twenty seconds fire an action potential that snaps the trap shut in about a tenth of a second. Discovered by colonists in the 1760s and a particular obsession of Darwin, who called it 'one of the most wonderful in the world'.

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