The walls of a Beijing subway station have been decorated with beautiful cartoon images of Chinese giant salamander since August 10. The eye-catching pictures have instilled new vitality into Tian’anmen East Station, which is on line 1 of the city’s subway system. It is a group of public service advertisements to appeal to more people to know the critically endangered animal, Chinese giant salamander.

The Chinese giant salamander is fully aquatic and is endemic to rocky mountain streams and lakes in China that has been listed as one of the top 10 "focal species" in 2008 by the Evolutionarily Distinct and Globally Endangered (EDGE) project. As rare as panda, it is considered to be a "living fossil". Although protected under Chinese law and CITES Appendix I, it is estimated that the wild population has declined by more than 80% since the 1950s.