Weakly Electric Fish
Weakly electric fish generate and electric current and use voltage sensors on their surface to locate prey. Mathematically this means they determine a change in a coefficient in and elliptic partial differential equation (the conductivity) from Cauchy data on their surface. Mathematically they “solve” the Calderón Inverse Conductivity problem, a problem that arises in medical electrical impedance tomography (EIT) and electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) in geophysics. |
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| Black Ghost Knifefish | Peters' Elephantnose Fish |
During the week 15-19 June 2009 the School of Mathematics is hosting the main annual meeting on Biomedical EIT, and an interdisciplinary workshop on electromagnetic inverse problems involving mathematicians, geophysicists and engineers. We also invited Mark Nelson an expert on electrosensing in fish, and we thought it only right to invite the real experts on the inverse conductivity problem: the weakly electric fish themselves!
We currently have one Peters' Elephantnose Fish (Gnathonemus petersii) an electrosensing fish from the Niger River in Africa and four Black Ghost Knifefish (Apteronotus albifrons) an electrosensing fish from the River Amazon. The albifrons are a lighter coloured variant than usual. Some Silver Sharks and Ruby Barbs are in the tank as well.
The fish tank can be seen on the Live Fish Cam (username fish password fish).
We would like to thank Andrew Gray, Curator of Herpetology at the Manchester Museum, for advice and loan of the tank, and the staff of the following local aquarium shops for their advice and help: Britain's Aquatic Superstore, Manchester Pets and Aquatics, Oasis Aquarium.This project is funded by EPSRC grant EP/G065047/
Bill Lionheart (Inverse Problems Group)
Elaine Render (Keeper of Mathematical Fish)