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Article: How does an electric eel manage to shock other creatures and yet not shock itself?
- Article from:
- The Boston Globe (Boston, MA)
- Article date:
- July 27, 2009
CopyrightCopyright 2009 The Boston Globe. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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It helps to think of an eel as being like a battery wrapped
inside tissue that includes cells, skin, and fat. Much like a
battery, an eel must be well-insulated and, yet, still capable of
generating power.
At the core of the eel sit three electrical organs that take up
about 80 percent of the eel's entire body volume. Each of those
electrical organs is made of specialized cells known as
electrocytes.
In two of the organs - the Main organ and Hunter's organ, - 5,000
to 6,000 electrocyte cells in concert manage to discharge jolts of
500 volts or more, with enough current to kill a person. A household
electrical outlet, by comparison, delivers a fourth as much voltage.
The third organ, Sachs's ...