Interdigital webbing

A floating skin is the skin that is formed between the toes or fingers floating animals.

It increases the efficiency of the swimming movements by increasing the surface of the moving hands or feet, allowing a better transfer of muscle force on the water.

Webs are elastic, so that the area of the moving limb can be downsized in the direction of movement opposite to the float again, and then to achieve the lowest possible water resistance. Animals with webbed are eg seals, beavers, ducks and amphibians.

In humans often occurs in conjunction with genetic syndromes malformation before, which is characterized by an intergrowth of fingers and / or toes: When syndactyly and polysyndactyly may be caused by a Hautverwachsung the unusual connection between the limbs, which resembles a webbed and is surgically removed as a rule, in order to ensure the normal mobility of the fingers and toes. However, even " unusual " connections fall through bone under this term.

• Anatomy (vertebrates )
• Malformation
• Anatomy of the skin