Highly prized as seafood, lobsters are economically important and are often one of the most profitable commodities in the coastal areas they populate.

The abdomen includes pleopods (also known as swimmerets), used for swimming, as well as the tail fan, composed of uropods and the telson.

Lobsters possess a green hepatopancreas, called the tomalley by chefs, which functions as the animal's liver and pancreas.

[10] Analysis of the neural gene complement revealed extraordinary development of the chemosensory machinery, including a profound diversification of ligand-gated ion channels and secretory molecules.

[12][13] Lobsters with atypical coloring are extremely rare, accounting for only a few of the millions caught every year, and due to their rarity, they usually are not eaten, instead being released back into the wild or donated to aquariums.

[43] This longevity may be due to telomerase, an enzyme that repairs long repetitive sections of DNA sequences at the ends of chromosomes, referred to as telomeres.

[44] However, unlike most vertebrates, lobsters express telomerase as adults through most tissue, which has been suggested to be related to their longevity.

Telomerase is especially present in green spotted lobsters, whose markings are thought to be produced by the enzyme interacting with their shell pigmentation.

According to Guinness World Records, the largest lobster ever caught was in Nova Scotia, Canada, weighing 20.15 kilograms (44.4 lb).

[51] Lobsters live in all oceans, on rocky, sandy, or muddy bottoms from the shoreline to beyond the edge of the continental shelf, contingent largely on size and age.

Larger, older lobsters are more likely to be found in deeper seas, migrating back to shallow waters seasonally.

[52] Lobsters are omnivores and typically eat live prey such as fish, mollusks, other crustaceans, worms, and some plant life.

Symbiotic animals of the genus Symbion, the only known member of the phylum Cycliophora, live exclusively on lobster gills and mouthparts.

[57] According to the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the mean level of mercury in American lobster between 2005 and 2007 was 0.107 ppm.

Large piles of lobster shells near areas populated by fishing communities attest to the crustacean's extreme popularity during this period.

Evidence indicates that lobster was being consumed as a regular food product in fishing communities along the shores of Britain,[59] South Africa,[59] Australia, and Papua New Guinea years ago.

A mosaic found in the ruins of Pompeii suggests that the spiny lobster was of considerable interest to the Roman population during the early imperial period.

Le Viandier de Taillevent, a French recipe collection written around 1300, suggests that lobster (also called saltwater crayfish) be "Cooked in wine and water, or in the oven; eaten in vinegar.

"[64] Le Viandier de Taillevent is considered to be one of the first "haute cuisine" cookbooks, advising on how to cook meals that would have been quite elaborate for the period and making usage of expensive and hard to obtain ingredients.

[66] A guidebook intended to provide advice for women running upper-class households, Le Ménagier de Paris is similar to its predecessor in that it indicates the popularity of lobster as a food among the upper classes.

During this time, influential households used the variety and variation of species served at feasts to display wealth and prestige.

In one notable instance, the Bishop of Salisbury offered at least 42 kinds of crustaceans and fish at his feasts over nine months, including several varieties of lobster.

[68] Lobster continued to be eaten as a delicacy and a general staple food among coastal communities until the late 17th century.

[77] American lobster was initially deemed worthy only of being used as fertilizer or fish bait, and until well into the 20th century, it was not viewed as more than a low-priced canned staple food.

Meanwhile, old-shell lobsters, which have not shed since the previous season and have a coarser flavor, can be air-shipped anywhere in the world and arrive alive, making them the most expensive.

Lobsters may also be killed or immobilized immediately before boiling by a stab into the brain (pithing), in the belief that this will stop suffering.

[86] The fossil record of clawed lobsters extends back at least to the Valanginian age of the Cretaceous (140 million years ago).