Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Cook, Verity A N O
• Groneberg, Antonia H
• Hoffmann, Maximilian
• Kadobianskyi, Mykola
• Veith, Johannes
• Schulze, Lisanne
• Henninger, Jörg
• Britz, Ralf
• Judkewitz, Benjamin

Titel

Ultrafast sound production mechanism in one of the smallest vertebrates

Ist Teil von

• Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS, 2024-03, Vol.121 (10), p.e2314017121-e2314017121

Ort / Verlag

United States: National Academy of Sciences

Erscheinungsjahr

2024

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Motion is the basis of nearly all animal behavior. Evolution has led to some extraordinary specializations of propulsion mechanisms among invertebrates, including the mandibles of the dracula ant and the claw of the pistol shrimp. In contrast, vertebrate skeletal movement is considered to be limited by the speed of muscle, saturating around 250 Hz. Here, we describe the unique propulsion mechanism by which , a miniature cyprinid fish of only 12 mm length, produces high amplitude sounds exceeding 140 dB (re. 1 µPa, at a distance of one body length). Using a combination of high-speed video, micro-computed tomography (micro-CT), RNA profiling, and finite difference simulations, we found that employ a unique sound production mechanism that involves a drumming cartilage, a specialized rib, and a dedicated muscle adapted for low fatigue. This apparatus accelerates the drumming cartilage at over 2,000 g, shooting it at the swim bladder to generate a rapid, loud pulse. These pulses are chained together to make calls with either bilaterally alternating or unilateral muscle contractions. use this remarkable mechanism for acoustic communication with conspecifics.