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Thomas M Annesley, Mollusks and Medicine, Clinical Chemistry, Volume 63, Issue 2, 1 February 2017, Pages 624–626, https://doi.org/10.1373/clinchem.2016.267278
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When you read about the relationship of science and the arts, you most often are presented with accounts of how the arts have been used to reflect science or scientific thought. In other words, the science comes before the art. Examples include paintings of surgeons in the operating theater, anatomists studying a human cadaver, the grand entrances of historic hospitals and libraries, even the works of science illustrators. But once in a while the opposite happens, where the art precedes the science, where natural elements, beloved for their beauty, serve as the inspiration or foundation for scientific discovery. Such is the case for the seashells of the world and the mollusks that produce these external skeletons from chemical elements found in the oceans.
One family of mollusks, the cone snails, produces a cone-shaped shell that is among the most beautiful and sought after seashells. As pieces of art on their own, the shells of the cone snails can fetch large sums of money, even by today's standards. In the 18th century, one such seashell, that of the Conus gloriamaris (glory of the sea cone) (Fig. 1), was valued at an amount comparable to Johannes Vermeer's Woman in Blue Reading a Letter (1), now a priceless part of the collection of the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam. The natural beauty of cone snails also provides a story of how collecting seashells ultimately led to scientific discovery, specifically a novel pain medicine.
