Isabella island

Isabella Island is an island nature reserve, with an area of 11.4 ha, in south-eastern Australia. It is part of Tasmania’s Big Green Island Group.

It was recently in the news because the scientists have claimed that a species of giant tortoise which influenced Charles Darwin’s ideas about evolution and has been feared extinct for 150 years may still be alive in the Galapagos Islands in the Pacific Ocean. The team has been able to get clue about the genetic footprint of the species Chelonoidis elephantopus in DNA of 84 tortoises from Isabela Island, part of the Galapagos island chain. During his historic voyage to the Galapagos in 1835, Charles Darwin noted that the shells of tortoises living on different islands had different shapes. The shells of C. elephantopus on Floreana were saddle-shaped while tortoises on other islands had dome-shaped shells.