A new report in the journal Nature says that one species of moray eel has a second set of jaws that reside in their throats before snapping down on your ankle during an eel attack:
High-speed videos and X-ray photos show how the second jaws, called pharyngeal jaws, lie in wait inside the throat, and then extend forwards into the mouth to grab prey that has been captured by the eel’s main teeth. The morsel is then drawn into the eel’s oesophagus.
The science blog at Nature.com compares this jaw action to that of the Alien in the movie of the same name. Only those aliens were eating humans and not shrimp, and a young Sigourney Weaver in her underpants wailing at a school of moray eels doesn’t quite have the same draw, now does it?
Anyway, the big question in the Pax Arcana is this: Why didn’t we already know this? Haven’t we seen enough dead eel carcasses by now to realize they’ve got a whole other set of jaws?
As usual, Nature provides an answer (sort of):
Many fish species have extra jaws in their throats, which can function to filter food from water or to grind prey when swallowing. But the eel’s extendable jaws are the first throat jaws known to be adapted to help catch prey, rather than simply to help swallow it, the researchers explain in Nature this week.
And to put the final pigtails on this pollyanna:
Westneat says the discovery harks back to an age when scientists discovered natural phenomena, rather than developing theories and testing them. He calls it “a classic example of discovery-based science, stemming from a ‘wow’ moment”.
Eels imitate Alien [News@Nature.com]
Eels with Alien-like double jaws [boing boing]
