Manding Nguyen

Andy pulls up some well water and then puts it in a little syringe.

Yeah.

All living organisms are constantly shedding DNA through our hair, our skin cells, our blood.

Scientists can take these clues, compare them to a large database of animal DNA, and then hope for a match.

It's a process called eDNA sampling.

Scientists have been using eDNA to find animals for about a decade now, and it's been a game-changer for monitoring wildlife.

eDNA sampling can't tell scientists an animal's age or the population size, but it's been used to detect invasive species and to rediscover lost ones.

But there's one problem.

The DNA of the original salamander was never preserved.

So even if Andy finds the eDNA he's looking for, he might not know it.

He has no original blanco-blind salamander DNA to compare it to.

Andy basically needs to take the eDNA he finds, compare it to the DNA of other living salamanders and other animals in the aquifer.

And if it's different in just the right way, it might belong to the Blanco blind salamander.

It's like trying to figure out where a puzzle piece goes.

You need to put the other pieces in place to see which one is missing and where it fits.

So what else lives in this aquifer?

What's their world like?

And do we know enough of this puzzle to place this missing salamander?

We had to get down there ourselves to find out.

Whoa.