The 3 Most Brutal Weapons in Nature

Protists, the first complex life forms with nuclei that evolved 2 billion years ago and are ancestors of all animals, plants, and fungi, have evolved three remarkable predatory weapons: Coleps hirtus uses a crown of toxicysts (poison syringes) that inject 19 chemicals to dissolve prey membranes; Pseudomicrothorax dubius employs a 22-armed mouth ring and acid vesicles to dissolve prey into soup; and Polykrikos kofoidii possesses a nematocyst-taeniocyst complex, a double-barrel harpoon gun that can pierce armored prey and pull them inside to be dissolved by acids.