Fish use sensors inside the lateral line trunk canal (LLTC) to detect the motion of water in their surroundings. The LLTC is a complex sensory organ consisting of a long tube no more than a few millimeters in diameter embedded immediately under the skin of the fish on each side of its body. In most fish, pore-like openings are regularly distributed along the LLTC, and a minute sensor enveloped in a gelatinous cupula, referred to as a neuromast, is located between each pair of pores. Drag forces resulting from fluid motions induced inside the LLTC by pressure fluctuations in the external flow stimulate the neuromasts. The present study investigates the motion-sensing characteristics of the LLTC and how it may be used by fish to track prey. A two-level numerical model is presented that couples the surrounding flow outside the LLTC to that stimulating the neuromasts within it. First the unsteady flow past a pair of simulated prey/predator fish in coasting motion is calculated using a Navier-Stokes solver. Then the pressure field associated with this external flow is used to drive the flow inside the LLTC of the predator, which creates the drag forces acting on the neuromast. The model is used to investigate the filtering properties and performance characteristics of the LLTC for a range of unsteady flows of biological interest. The results obtained suggest that the LLTC preferentially filters high frequency pressure gradient oscillations, and hence high frequency accelerations, associated with the external flow.

Volume Subject Area:
Fluids Engineering
Topics:
Canals, Flow (Dynamics), Drag (Fluid dynamics), Pressure, Sensors, Unsteady flow, Computer simulation, Filters, Filtration, Fluctuations (Physics), Fluids, Oscillations, Performance characterization, Pressure gradient, Skin, Water
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