Hammerhead sharks utilize a “breath-holding” technique to preserve body temperature level while hunting in deep, cold waters, according to a new study. The study used remote biologgers implanted in adult sharks to determine depth, water temperature, activity rates, body motions, and internal body temperature. The scientists found that the sharks preserved raised body temperature levels throughout the inmost part of each dive by closing their mouths and/or gill slits, reducing the flow of cold water across their gills.
Hammerhead sharks use a “breath-holding” technique to maintain body temperature while hunting in deep, cold waters, according to a brand-new research study. This previously unnoticed phenomenon is comparable to thermoregulation methods used by marine mammals and may be common to name a few deep-diving sharks and fishes. The study used remote biologgers implanted in adult sharks to measure depth, water temperature, activity rates, body language, and internal body temperature level. The researchers found that the sharks maintained raised body temperature levels throughout the inmost part of each dive by closing their mouths and/or gill slits, reducing the circulation of cold water throughout their gills. More research is needed to validate this thermoregulation technique, but it could be extensive among other epipelagic and teleost fishes.
Hammerhead sharks “hold their breath” to preserve body temperature while searching in cold, deep waters, a strategy that may prevail to name a few deep-diving marine animals.
Hammerhead sharks “hold their breath” to keep body temperature level as they hunt in deep, cold waters, according to a brand-new study. The previously unnoticed and unanticipated phenomenon, which has broad similarities to breath-holding thermoregulation techniques employed by marine mammals, might be prevalent among other deep-diving sharks and fishes.
Like most fishes, sharks are fully ectothermic, and their body temperature levels are mainly regulated by their instant environment. This can present a physiological challenge for big predatory fish who need to preserve particular body temperatures to work yet endeavor into chillier, deeper waters to find prey.
Scalloped hammerhead sharks (Sphyrna lewini), which occupy warm surface area waters in tropical and temperate seaside areas, routinely make repeated deep dives to depths surpassing 800 meters where water temperatures can get as low as 4 degrees Celsius to hunt for victim. Offered their absence of vascular and morphological adaptations to actively save temperature, its unknown how these sharks can maintain body temperature level throughout deep, frigid dives.
To explore this mystery, Mark Royer and coworkers developed cutting edge remote biologgers, implanted internally in adult sharks, that measured depth, ambient water temperature level, activity rates, body movements, and internal body temperature level. The authors discovered that the sharks preserved an elevated body temperature (up to 20 degrees Celsius above ambient temperature levels) throughout the inmost part of each dive and just rapidly started to lose heat on their go back to the surface area.
Royer et al. suggest that the sharks preserve their temperature by successfully “holding their breath” while diving. By closing their mouths and/or gill slits securely to decrease the circulation of cold water across the gills, the sharks might reduce the loss of body heat due to “breathing” cold water. The rapid loss of temperature during their climb to warmer waters most likely reflects the reopening of gill slits and convective heat transfer.
The authors note that more research study is required to verify the thermoregulation method.
” Given the efficiency of breath holding and the strong selective forces that form behavioral and physiological thermoregulation, this technique might be prevalent to name a few epipelagic and teleost fishes,” compose Mark Meekan and Adrian Gleiss in a related Perspective.
Recommendation: ” Breath holding as a thermoregulation method in the scalloped hammerhead” 11 May 2023, Science.DOI: 10.1126/ science.add4445.