this post was submitted on 28 Feb 2024
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Biodiversity

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Welcome to c/Biodiversity @ Mander.xyz!

A community about the variety of life on Earth at all levels; including plants, animals, bacteria, and fungi.



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Biodiversity is a term used to describe the enormous variety of life on Earth. It can be used more specifically to refer to all of the species in one region or ecosystem. Biodiversity refers to every living thing, including plants, bacteria, animals, and humans. Scientists have estimated that there are around 8.7 million species of plants and animals in existence. However, only around 1.2 million species have been identified and described so far, most of which are insects. This means that millions of other organisms remain a complete mystery.

Over generations, all of the species that are currently alive today have evolved unique traits that make them distinct from other species. These differences are what scientists use to tell one species from another. Organisms that have evolved to be so different from one another that they can no longer reproduce with each other are considered different species. All organisms that can reproduce with each other fall into one species. Read more...

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[–] autotldr@lemmings.world 3 points 1 year ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:


One of the world’s smallest fish, measuring about the width of an adult human fingernail, can make a sound as loud as a gunshot, scientists have said.

The male Danionella cerebrum, a fish of about 12mm found in the streams of Myanmar, produces sounds that exceed 140 decibels, according to the study published in the PNAS journal, equal to an ambulance siren or jackhammer.

The most common mechanism in fishes to produce sound involved vibrations of their swim bladder – a gas-filled organ used to control buoyancy – driven by rhythmic contractions of specialised “drumming” muscles, the paper said.

The scientists at Charité University in Berlin have found the fish has a unique sound production system, involving a drumming cartilage, specialised rib and fatigue-resistant muscle.

To produce sound, a rib that lies next to the swim bladder is moved by a special muscle into a piece of cartilage.

The scientists have not established why the fish make such loud sounds but suggested it could help navigate murky waters or be an aggressive tactic used by males to warn off competition.


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