THE African clawed frog is a supreme night hunter – so good that even blinded frogs can distinguish edible insects from inedible ones. Now a team of physicists has developed a model to explain how the frogs achieve this feat.
The frogs hunt by lurking underwater with just their eyes protruding above the surface. As soon as an insect falls into the water, the frogs home in on it. But adults hunt only at night, when their eyes are useless. Instead, they detect the ripples an insect makes as it flounders, using 180 specialised sensory receptors in their skin. “[The receptors]…
