Star-nosed Mole

The nose is about 1.5 cm (0.59 in) in diameter with its Eimer's organs distributed on 22 appendages. Eimer's organs were first described in the European mole in 1872 by German zoologist Theodor Eimer. Other mole species also possess Eimer's organs, though they are not as specialized or numerous as in the star-nosed mole. Because the star-nosed mole is functionally blind, the snout was long suspected to be used to detect electrical activity in prey animals, though little, if any, empirical support has been found for this hypothesis. The nasal star and dentition of this species appear to be primarily adapted to exploit extremely small prey. A report in the journal Nature gives this animal the title of fastest-eating mammal, taking as little as 120 milliseconds (average: 227 ms) to identify and consume individual food items. Its brain decides in approximately eight milliseconds if prey is edible or not. This speed is at the limit of the speed of neurons.