In vivo intraoral waterflow quantification reveals hidden mechanisms of suction feeding in fish.

ABSTRACT: Virtually all fishes rely on flows of water to transport food to the back of their pharynx. While external flows that draw food into the mouth are well described, how intraoral waterflows manage to deposit food at the esophagus entrance remains unknown. In theory, the posteriorly moving water must, at some point, curve laterally and/or ventrally to exit through the gill slits. Such flows would eventually carry food away from the esophagus instead of toward it. This apparent paradox calls for a filtration mechanism to deviate food from the suction-feeding streamlines. To study this gap in our fundamental understanding of how fishes feed, we developed and applied a new technique to quantify three-dimensional (3D) patterns of intraoral waterflows in vivo. We combined stereoscopic high-speed X

SUBMITTER: Provini P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8906803 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature