Research Article     • Andrew R. Thurber mail,      Affiliation:
Integrative Oceanography Division, Scripps Institution of
Oceanography, La Jolla, California, United States of America
• William J. Jones,      Affiliation: Environmental Genomics
Core Facility, Environmental Health Sciences, University of
South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina, United States of
America    • Kareen Schnabel      Affiliation: National
Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, Kilbirnie,
Wellington, New Zealand    • Published: November 30, 2011   •
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0026243   • Published in PLOS ONE
Vent and seep animals harness chemosynthetic energy to thrive
far from the sun's energy. While symbiont-derived energy fuels
many taxa, vent crustaceans have remained an enigma; these
shrimps, crabs, and barnacles possess a phylogenetically
distinct group of chemosynthetic bacterial epibionts, yet the
role of these bacteria has remained unclear. We test whether a
new species of Yeti crab, which we describe as Kiwa pur