2024-07-28 02:44:40
The vastness of the oceans are the dark places of beings that carry their own fire. Bioluminescence is used by many fish to attract prey and often to find a mate. Males have larger photophores, the organs that produce light, than females. Of course, that can represent a problem for them, who are not able to find a possible remote company. The dragon fish, a small but ferocious predator, seems to have found a solution. You’ve got big eyes just for love.
A new study by Boston College researchers discovered that the male dragonfish’s eyes grow larger to find inconspicuous females in the dark, making the species an anomaly in vertebrate evolution.
As the team explained in the magazine ‘Biology letters‘ from the Royal Society, dragonfish survive thanks to many adaptations, including brilliant bioluminescence. But women are not as bright as men. “We found that these male dragons have developed larger eyes to find females that produce less light,” said Christopher P. Kenaley, author of the report. “It’s very surprising and it gives us very important information about how little-known species exist and thrive in the ocean.”
Sexual dimorphism in vertebrate visual systems is extremely rare, Kenaley added. “Perhaps this is the second known case in fish, the largest group of vertebrates.”
The fact that males have larger photophores, organs that produce light, than females can indicate a problem when looking for a partner. “This creates a paradox: if bioluminescence is important for sexual signaling and finding each other, this dimorphism results in a scenario in which females can see males at shorter distances than the other way around,” he said. “In In summary, there is a gap in the discovery of bioluminescence. “Our hypothesis is that, to close this gap, men may have had larger eyes to receive more light.”
Researchers studied two species of deep-sea dragon ( Malacosteus Niger y Photostomias guernei ) that showed sexual dimorphism in the size of their photophores. The team modeled the distance at which males and females of each species can see members of the opposite species. This depends on the size of the face and the amount of light that the other member can produce.
The researchers found that there was a substantial detection gap in both structures that ranged from a few meters to more than 100 meters. They also found that males of both species have large eyes and that this dimorphism closes the gap by approximately 5 meters. It is a modest improvement, they note, but essential for the difficult task of finding a rare match in such a species. open system.
In previous work, marine biologists stated that there is a gap in the research of what is happening in living things. The team led by Boston College was the first to examine the extent of this gap and, more importantly, whether these species may have had larger eyes in males.
Kenaley said future work could focus on why the bioluminescence of male dragonfish is brighter than that of female dragonfish. “We still don’t know exactly why there is luminescent dimorphism in these and other aquatic species,” he said. “Perhaps it is a way to signal to each other that a member of the opposite tribe is nearby. To answer this question, more studies like ours will be needed to establish a pattern of how detection distances vary with levels of dimorphism.”
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