- Updated 10:55 24 January 2012
- Magazine issue 2848. Subscribe and save
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NICE fangs, shame about the bite. The
oversize fangs of some dragonfish may help them to snap their weak jaws
shut around prey, improving their odds of bagging a meal.
The dragonfish family (Stomiidae) go
after large prey, and so have jaws that open wide. Closing them quickly
is not easy, says Christopher Kenaley of Harvard University, since drag
increases exponentially with jaw length, and rises even more if bulky
prey are sticking out the front. What's more, dragonfish jaw muscles are
very weak.
Kenaley built a computer model of the
jaws and found that shutting them around prey lying on its side took up
to 1 second - more than enough time to allow it to get away. However,
that dropped to just 125 milliseconds when the prey was lodged upright
between the teeth.
Kenaley says the results suggest the
fangs may not just impale prey as previously thought but help keep it in
the best orientation to reduce drag on the jaw when it shuts. He
presented the findings earlier this month at the Society for Integrative
and Comparative Biology meeting in Charleston, South Carolina.
When this article was first published, it incorrectly mentioned anglerfish instead of dragonfish.
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