From the perspective of the various terrifying creatures in Hollywood movies, the stonefish are simply a special thing - they are the most vicious and sharp fish known to mankind, and they have many sharp fin-like protrusions on their bodies that can be suddenly released and attacked at you in a very short time.
But now that we know that our violent nature of the stonefish is still underestimated, scientists have found that the species basically hides sliced bone blades under each eye socket.
As shown above, Smith et al. mentioned in the paper that this sword-like skeleton emits a brilliant blue light, like a lightsaber | the zoological journal Copeia
The researchers called the razor-like skeleton "lachrymal saber," a terrible skeletal structure that appears to be unique to stonefish.
"I don't know why no one has found out before," says William Leosmith of the University of Kansas, "probably because only one or two people have worked in this field." ”
Stonefish also have some muscles and bones, including the orbiter, maxilla and adductor mandible. These physiology has been modestly altered to accommodate and control their dangerous weapon systems.
"This branch of fish is known as 'turtles' or scorpions, and they are characterized by bones under the eyes attached to the gill skeleton," Smith said. Because all these muscles are attached to the gill skeleton, the stone fish can exert the power of the 'sword-like' bone blade through their power. ”
When it is deployed in place, it looks like a deadly beard, and the 'sword' is horizontally outwards, rather than the tip of the knife forward.
When it 'sheaths', the bone moves downwards and securely adheres to the face of the stonefish.
Scientists were somehow already aware of the presence of these bone spurs on the tear glands — they were on the face, after all, and no one was blind — and Smith's finding was that the species was able to better use these self-contained armaments by altering a large number of physiological structures.
Smith dissected a Lepidoptera (Paracentropogon longispinis) 15 years ago when he discovered the strange structure of the sword-like bone spur.
Since then, identifying how this physiology works and looking for all potential fish with this trait has been a long scientific path for Smith.
Thankfully, the latest study not only sheds light on the mechanism by which sword-like bone spurs work, but also sheds light on the evolution of this defense mechanism, and even rewrites the definition of the stonefish to include many other species that were thought to belong to other lineages.
The Smith and University of Kansas team genetically analyzed 113 morphological features and 5280 molecular features of 63 species of stonefish.
"Every kind of stone fish I studied (Synanceiidae) has this trait [lachrymal sabers], which will be the breast that defines mammals." Smith clarified in an email.
"This paper greatly modifies the original definition of the stonefish and makes it a much larger lineage ... This entry now includes velvet, scaly, squid, etc. ”
Who would have guessed that a deadly beard in the eye socket would become a modifier of the rules of the game?
This article is translated from sciencealert and published by translator majer under the Creative Commons License (BY-NC).
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