If you are into betting on snail races, here’s a tip: put your money on the least slimy snail. Making mucus requires energy, and it turns out that snails slither best when they produce as little as possible of just the right kind of goo.
Snails, slugs and other gastropods move by using their muscles to generate travelling waves of stress in the thin layers of mucus they lay down. Because it takes more energy to produce the mucus than to power their muscles, they need to get by with the thinnest layer possible.
The key to their success seems…
