Electric eel

About Electric eel

A freshwater South American knifefish capable of generating up to 860-volt electric discharges.

Electrophorus electricus is the best-known species of electric eel. It is a South American electric fish. Until the discovery of two additional species in 2019, the genus was classified as the monotypic, with this species the only one in the genus. Despite the name, it is not an eel, but rather a knifefish. It is considered as a freshwater teleost which contains an electrogenic tissue that produces electric discharges.

Electrophorus electricus is the best-known species of electric eel. It is a South American electric fish. Until the discovery of two additional species in 2019, the genus was classified as the monotypic, with this species the only one in the genus. Despite the name, it is not an eel, but rather a knifefish. It is considered as a freshwater teleost which contains an electrogenic tissue that produces electric discharges. Taxonomic history The species has been reclassified several times. When originally described by Carl Linnaeus in 1766, he used the name Gymnotus electricus, placing it in the same genus as Gymnotus carapo (banded knifefish) which he had described several years earlier. It was only about a century later, in 1864, that the electric eel was moved to its own genus Electrophorus by Theodore Gill. In September 2019, David de Santana et al. suggested the division of the genus into three species based on DNA divergence, ecology and habitat, anatomy and physiology, and electrical ability: E. electricus, E. voltai sp. nov., and E. varii sp. nov. The study found E. electricus to be the sister species to E. voltai, with both species diverging during the Pliocene. Anatomy…