Knifefish use electric fields to develop a complex social hierarchy

By Jake Buehler

The rivers of the tropical Americas hum and crackle with electric fields generated by knifefish. The fish use electric discharges to search their murky surroundings for food and to communicate with mates. But new research suggests these electric signals may also be used to develop and maintain a sophisticated social order.

Brown ghost knifefish (Apteronotus leptorhynchus) are related to electric eels, but rather than emitting powerful jolts, the fish continuously produce weak electric fields. Still, when Till Raab, a neuroethologist at the University of Tübingen in Germany, and his …