Elastic energy storage in seahorses leads to a unique suction flow dynamics compared to other actinopterygian

Suction feeding is a dominant prey-capture strategy across actinopterygians, consisting of a rapid expansion of the mouth cavity that drives a flow of water containing the prey into the mouth. Suction feeding is a power-hungry behavior, involving the actuation of cranial muscles as well as the anterior third of the fish's swimming muscles. Seahorses, which have reduced swimming muscles, evolved a unique mechanism for elastic energy storage that powers their suction flows. This mechanism allows seahorses to achieve head rotation speeds that are 50 times faster than fish lacking such a mechanism. However, it is unclear how the dynamics of suction flows in seahorses differ from the conserved pattern observed across other actinopterygians, nor how differenced in snout length across seahorses affect these flows. Using flow visualization experiments, we show that seahorses generate suction flows that are 8 times faster than similar-sized fish, and that the temporal patterns of cranial kinemat...

吸食捕食是辐鳍鱼类（actinopterygians）中主导的猎物捕获策略，其机制为口腔快速扩张，驱动含猎物的水流进入口中。吸食捕食是一种高耗能行为，需要激活头部肌肉以及鱼类游泳肌肉的前三分之一。海马的游泳肌肉退化，演化出一种独特的弹性储能机制，为其吸食水流提供动力。这种机制使海马的头部旋转速度比缺乏该机制的鱼类快50倍。不过，目前尚不清楚海马吸食水流的动力学特征与其他辐鳍鱼类中观察到的保守模式有何差异，也不清楚海马吻部长度的差异如何影响这些水流。通过流场可视化实验，我们发现海马产生的吸食水流速度是体型相似鱼类的8倍，且其头部运动学的时间模式……