Theoretical Analysis of Pre-Receptor Image Conditioning in Weakly Electric Fish
Figure 4
The Effect of Internal Conductivity on Electric Image Generation
(A) Normalized electric images of the same metal cube (identical position) on fish with different internal conductivities. Red: 16.5 μScm−1 (the same as water conductivity), cyan: 165 μScm−1, blue: 1,650 μScm−1, black: 16,500 μScm−1 (normal conductivity), magenta: 165,000 μScm−1. The skin is modelled for all cases, with a homogeneous conductivity of 500,000 μScm−1. The dashed line shows the case of a fish with realistic internal conductivity and skin conductivity distribution. rl, realistic internal conductivity; rlh, realistic internal conductivity, heterogeneous skin distribution.
(B) Peak amplitude of the electric image of a metal cube (1 cm3) placed at 0.5 mm from the fish, as a function of body internal conductivity. The difference in the peak amplitude of the electric image corresponding to the realistic internal conductivity fish shown in this figure and that shown in Figure 1 is due to the use of two compartment bodies (see Materials and Methods).