Totoaba

A stroll through a Chinese street market offers a glimpse into centuries-old traditions, showcasing jars and pouches filled with herbs, spices, medicinal ingredients, and even dried seahorses and fish. Among these, swimming bladders—known as the “cocaine of the seas”—have become a prized item on display.

Vaquita porpoises are on the edge of extinction, with just 10 left in their sole habitat within Mexico's Gulf of California.

However, a new study published in the journal Science offers some hope: the world's rarest marine mammals aren't doomed by a lack of genetic diversity, and can recover if illegal "gillnet" fishing ceases immediately.