Why Don't Electric Eels Shock Themselves?

2023-12-20

[public] 118K views, 12.4K likes, dislikes audio only

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Electric eels can emit some of the largest shocks in the animal kingdom - but why don't they shock themselves?

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To learn more about this topic, start your googling with these keywords:

- Electrocyte: a modified muscle or nerve cell that generates electricity in the electric organ of certain fishes

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Leonardo Souza | Script Writer and Narrator

Kate Yoshida | Script Editor

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REFERENCES

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Raimundo Nonato Gomes Mendes Júnior (2023). Analista Ambiental, Instituto Chico Mendes de Conservação da Biodiversidade. Personal Communication

Babineau D, Longtin A, & Lewis JE (2006). Modeling the electric field of weakly electric fish. Journal of Experimental Biology 209: 3636–3651. https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.02403

Bauer, R (1979). Electric organ discharge (EOD) and prey capture behaviour in the electric eel, Electrophorus electricus. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 4: 311–319.

Bennett, MVL(1971).Electric organs. In Fish Physiology, W.S. Hoar, and D.J. Randall,eds. (AcademicPress),pp.347–491. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00303239

Catania K (2014). The shocking predatory strike of the electric eel. Science 346, 1231–1234 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1260807

Catania, KC (2015). Electric Eels Concentrate Their Electric Field to Induce Involuntary Fatigue in Struggling Prey. Current Biology, 25(22), 2889–2898. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2015.09.036

Catania, K.C. (2015). An optimized biological TASER: electric eels remotely induce or arrest movement in nearby prey. Brain, Behavior and Evolution 86: 38–47. https://doi.org/10.1159/000435945

de Santana, C et al. (2019). Unexpected species diversity in electric eels with a description of the strongest living bioelectricity generator. Nature Communications, 10(1), 4000–. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-11690-z

Markham MR (2013). Electrocyte physiology: 50 years later. Journal of Experimental Biology, 216(13), 2451–2458. https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.082628