Pfft! Anyone can navigate with a smartphone… Try a compass! This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Many marine animals, like sharks and rays, migrate seasonally. How do they find their way? Bryan Keller and team from Florida State University wondered if sharks use Earth’s magnetic
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Surfing Sharks
“Just keep swimming…just keep swimming….” This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Imagine having to constantly walk in order to breathe. Sounds exhausting — but that’s a shark’s reality! Sharks MUST keep swimming to get oxygen over their gills. Do they EVER get a break? Yannis
Continue readingSharky Soundtracks
Can you hear “the music of the . . . deep?” This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Remember “Jaws?!” Brrrr! I don’t know which was scarier the thirty foot shark or that creepy soundtrack! Andrew Nosal from UC San Diego and colleagues pressed play. They
Continue readingSurfing Sharks
“Just keep swimming…just keep swimming….” This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Imagine having to constantly walk in order to breathe. Sounds exhausting — but that’s a shark’s reality! Sharks MUST keep swimming to get oxygen over their gills. Do they EVER get a break? Yannis
Continue readingFin-tastic Navigation
Sky of blue, a sea of green . . . but which way’s home? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. I can’t even find the grocery store without my GPS! But some sharks migrate loooong distances. How do they plan their route without underwater Google
Continue readingBaby Shark Food
What has rows of sharp pearly whites?! This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science, saying… BABY SHARK! Mighty Jaws sits on top of the oceanic food throne. Where adult white sharks munch on marine mammals, like dolphins, found near the water’s surface. But when you’re a
Continue readingGlowing Sharks
Lions and tigers and glowing sharks, oh my? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science, saying: We’re gonna need a bigger boat! Lots of ocean-dwelling animals glow. Biofluorescence allows a marine animal–say, a shark–to take in light and convert it to a different color. What color?
Continue readingVeggie Shark
Have you ever met a shark who’s a….vegetarian? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Okay, so maybe not a STRICT vegetarian. But there IS a shark who eats more seagrass than fish! It’s the bonnethead shark—a small relative of hammerheads. Samantha Leigh and her colleagues
Continue readingShark Sense
When it comes to hunting prey, what’s a shark’s secret? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science, saying: They’ve got it under their skin. Sharks can detect electrical fields of moving prey. How? They have a network of pores around their snout called ampullae of Lorenzini.
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