Friday, April 29, 2011



Communication within a species is most effective when it is exclusive, so it is beneficial to recognize signals from your own kind and exclude those made by others. Some fish species living in muddy rivers overcome the challenge of living in a low-visibility environment by electrical signaling. While studying the distinctive patterns of discharges from African electrical fish, Carlson et al. (p. 583) discovered that the evolution of key sensory processing regions in the brain allowed for rapid diversification in one group but was minimal in a closely related group that had diverged prior to the evolution of the sensory innovations. Species within the diversified clade possess receptor morphology that is more efficient at transmitting and discerning complex electric signals than those of the less diverse group, implying that key innovations in brain development can lead to speciation because of improved perception and species recognition. Wireless aquatic signalling and packet exchange has also become important in our contemporary milieu of free-swimming eternal silicon brain tadpoles. As external receptor sites read the viral plankton, data pathways may become engorged with virtual chatterlings whose pressure amplitudes are wont to become transversal pleasure amplitudes, thus giving rise to the wireless electrical packet exchange we all now so enjoy!