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An electric fish is any fish that can generate electric fields, whether to sense things around them, for defence, or to stun prey. Most fish able to produce shocks are also electroreceptive, meaning that they can sense electric fields. The only exception is the stargazer family (Uranoscopidae). Electric fish, although a small minority of all ...
Electric eel skeleton, with the long vertebral column at top, the row of bony rays below. Electric eels have long, stout bodies, being somewhat cylindrical at the front but more flattened towards the tail end. E. electricus can reach 2 m (6 ft 7 in) in length, and 20 kg (44 lb) in weight. The mouth is at the front of the snout, and opens upwards.
Active electrolocation is practised by two groups of weakly electric fish, the Gymnotiformes (knifefishes) and the Mormyridae (elephantfishes), and by Gymnarchus niloticus, the African knifefish. An electric fish generates an electric field using an electric organ, modified from muscles in its tail. The field is called weak if it is only enough ...
Electric organs are derived from modified muscle or in some cases nerve tissue, called electrocytes, and have evolved at least six times among the elasmobranchs and teleosts. These fish use their electric discharges for navigation, communication, mating, defence, and in strongly electric fish also for the incapacitation of prey.
Electric catfish or Malapteruridae is a family of catfishes (order Siluriformes). This family includes two genera, Malapterurus and Paradoxoglanis, with 21 species. [1] Several species of this family have the ability to generate electricity, delivering a shock of up to 350 volts from its electric organ. [2]
The convergent evolution between the South American gymnotiforms and the African Mormyridae is remarkable, with the electric organ being produced by the substitution of the same amino acid in the same voltage-gated sodium channel despite the two groups of fish being on different continents and the evolution of the electric sense organ being ...
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Electrophorus electricus is the best-known species of electric eel. It is a South American electric fish. Until the discovery of two additional species in 2019, the genus was classified as the monotypic, with this species the only one in the genus. [2] Despite the name, it is not an eel, but rather a knifefish. [3]