What Exactly Is: Crocodile Icefish | The White-Blooded Fish

Описание: Although we are mostly familiar with red coloured blood, various animals have different blood colour. What’s quite unique is a colourless blood, and that do exist. The crocodile icefish is the only vertebrate without red blood. Even though their uniqueness might sound fascinating, it’s actually quite costly for them and a lot of compensations are needed to survive.


Timestamps
0:00 Opening Thought
0:49 Taxonomy and General Information
2:16 Morphology
4:02 Blood and Iron
8:35 Lifestyle and Behaviour


References
Corliss, B. A., Delalio, L. J., Stevenson Keller, T. C., 4th, Keller, A. S., Keller, D. A., Corliss, B. H., Beers, J. M., Peirce, S. M., & Isakson, B. E. (2019). Vascular Expression of Hemoglobin Alpha in Antarctic Icefish Supports Iron Limitation as Novel Evolutionary Driver. Frontiers in physiology, 10, 1389. https://doi.org/10.3389/fphys.2019.01389

Beers, J. M., & Jayasundara, N. (2015). Antarctic notothenioid fish: what are the future consequences of 'losses' and 'gains' acquired during long-term evolution at cold and stable temperatures?. The Journal of experimental biology, 218(Pt 12), 1834–1845. https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.116129

Sidell, B. D., & O'Brien, K. M. (2006). When bad things happen to good fish: the loss of hemoglobin and myoglobin expression in Antarctic icefishes. The Journal of experimental biology, 209(Pt 10), 1791–1802. https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.02091

Corliss, B. A., Delalio, L. J., Stevenson Keller, T. C., 4th, Keller, A. S., Keller, D. A., Corliss, B. H., Beers, J. M., Peirce, S. M., & Isakson, B. E. (2019). Vascular Expression of Hemoglobin Alpha in Antarctic Icefish Supports Iron Limitation as Novel Evolutionary Driver. Frontiers in physiology, 10, 1389. https://doi.org/10.3389/fphys.2019.01389

Purser, A., Hehemann, L., Boehringer, L., Tippenhauer, S., Wege, M., Bornemann, H., Pineda-Metz, S. E. A., Flintrop, C. M., Koch, F., Hellmer, H. H., Burkhardt-Holm, P., Janout, M., Werner, E., Glemser, B., Balaguer, J., Rogge, A., Holtappels, M., & Wenzhoefer, F. (2022). A vast icefish breeding colony discovered in the Antarctic. Current biology : CB, 32(4), 842–850.e4. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2021.12...

Froese, R. and D. Pauly. Editors. (2025). FishBase. Channichthyidae Gill, 1861. Accessed through: World Register of Marine Species at: https://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.p...


Outro
The Soundlings - Silent Night (Youtube Library)


Thumbnail Image
Blood: Jody M. Beers
Larva: uwe kils


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