"How vampire bats find blood
How vampire bats know precisely where to bite to strike a blood-spurting vein close to the skin has always been a mystery — until now.
A team of American and Venezuelan scientists studying wild vampire bats in South America has discovered a heat-sensing molecule called TRPV1 covering nerve endings on the bats' noses.
The finding, published in this week's journal Nature, shows how small changes to a particular species' genes can lead to important evolutionary adaptations."
source:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/st...t-seeking.html
http://www.nature.com/news/2011/1108....2011.454.html
Gracheva, E.O et al. (2011). Ganglion-specific splicing of TRPV1 underlies infrared sensation in vampire bats.
Nature, 476: 88-91.