액소로틀(Axolotl)에 대한 역사적 고찰: 변태 현상이 야기했던 생물학적/발생학적 이슈들을 중심으로

Abstract

The axolotl, Ambystoma mexicanum in its binomial name, lives its whole life in nature as an aquatic and gilled organism and reproduces in its juvenile form, which indicates that it is a neotenic salamander. However, it also surprisingly metamorphoses into an adult form of salamander which does pulmonary respiration. This study is a historical research on how the axolotl, introduced from its habitat(Mexico) to France in 1863, has been a significant research organism to the biologists of both Europe and North America in the late 19th and the early 20th centuries, considering the metamorphosis issues in embryology of those days. Particularly, the study deals with (1) the historic course whereby the axolotl came to draw the considerable attention of researchers, (2) the issues in its species identification and the investigation of the metamorphosis mechanism, (3) the controversies that the axolotl stirred in evolutionary biology with a particular attention to recapitulation theory.