hey there!  welcome to the new episode of Curiosity! A series in which we will answer some of the questions that makes us all curious.

Electric Eels are one of the most fascinating and shocking organisms at the same time. You might have heard different stories about these creatures. Even the scientists in the past were not sure what these organism is really capable of. You might have watched in Cartoons and TV shows, Electric Eels killing people by generating strong electric volts under water Or Electric Eels being used as a power source to power up some sort of under water vehicle (As Shown in Journey 2 Movie). All these things sounds like a science fiction but this made me think how do these This Electric Eels really generate electricity?. What are they capable of? and can they produce enough electricity to kill humans ? Let's Find out.

A Quick Intro about Electric Eels

Well, They are not what you might think. Electric Eels are not even eels. They are actually a type of Knife Fish. The scientific name for the electric eels is  Electrophorus electricus and is the only Species for its genus. True Eels are quite different from electric eels. The most significant differences between them is True eels are mostly marines and Electric eels are fresh water fishes. Also, Electric eels have no teeth unlike true eels. 

Fig: Knife Fish (Credits)

Electric eels are mostly found in fresh water sources. Best place to find them is in the rivers of Amazon. Also found  in the creeks , swamps, mud or stagnant waters of South America.

How do They Generate Electricity?

Sometimes Electric Eels can produce the shock up to mind blowing 600 volts. These fishes are not the only fishes  that can use electric fields for their movements and tracking of prey but these are the only one which can produce enough charge to kill it's prey. What makes them so powerful ? . 

The Electric Eels and other fishes which have these abilities have developed  modified muscles cells. These are also called electrocytes. These electrocytes stacks on top of each other just like a typical battery. Therefore Electrocytes are the main source of Electricity in Electric eels. They are just arranged like a battery in a flash light.

One electrocyte can only generate 0.15 Volts. Sound very less, isn't it? But wait, In a large Electric Eel, there can be up to 6000 electrolytes cells stacked on top of each other. This makes a one single giant battery that can produce up to 600 Volts. 80% of the eels body is covered with electrocytes assuming that the eel is 1 meter long. A car battery produces only 12 Volts of electricity, therefore Electric Eels can produce electricity 50 times more powerful than that.

Fig: Electrocytes Stacked (Credits)

There is not just one single stack of cells, There are many. All these stacks of modifies cells are combined and they are used to generate a pulse of electricity. As we know , electricity is very poorly conducted in the pure water. So, ho do they generate it? Well it turns out, the fresh water where these eels live have right amount of  salt and minerals to conduct electricity. When a Eels shocks its prey, the Electricity runs from the front part, through the water and to ends in the tail just like batteries. Any predator or prey in this area will feel a powerful electric shock.

Fig: A complete Circuit system (Credits)

Can this fish kill a human?

Even though Electric eels can be very deadly but they are not strong Enough to Kill a human. This is because shocks generated by this fish is delivered very very quickly, just in the matter of some milliseconds. This might still be very painful and might even cause a temporary paralysis but you certainly wont die. 

But still these Electric Shocks are strong enough to kill small invertebrates and small fishes. Sometimes the small fishes it shocked are just paralyzed, this fishes are fast enough to swallow it's prey before it recovers.

Do they Shock themselves?

I personally have heard this question many times. "Do they shock themselves or not?" after all they are in the same place where their prey is. Well, the answer might shock you. They do shock themselves. But wait there is more to the story. They keep on shocking small preys all the time, while shocking their preys they seems to curl up as if they were shocked too. But we can clearly observe , this electric shock don't affect them are are not so deadly to themselves. There is a theory that , they might have been resistant to their own shock in the course of evolution. Some scientists say, their body must be insulated, but whole body cant be insulated because the current need to return back to the tail just like batteries. However, There might be insulation of only vital organs of the eels.

But still, these are all assumptions and no one really knows how do they protect themselves by their own weapon.

 Well, thats it for this Episode. Hope you Enjoyed it , if you did Upvote and comment your thoughts below. Thank you!!

Stay Curious.

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References used:

[1]- Eels Wikipedia

[2]- How do they Generate Electricity?

[3]- Are Electric Eel Dangerous?

[4]- Do Electric Eel Shock Themselves?

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