Urban legend has it electric eels inspired Allessandro Volta to build the first electric battery in 1800. Certainly, these wily members of the Electrophorus genus are unusually smart. That’s because they don’t flatten their batteries to kill their prey, they just deliver enough to stun. So could electric eels give batteries a few tips? Institute of Mechanical Engineers seems to think so!
Which Tips Could Electric Eels Have in Store?
Well first of all, the electric organ of an eel comprises three abdominal parts that generate low, and high voltage electricity. These organs contain electrolytes, and are aligned to allow a current of ions to flow through them. They also stack in series, so each successive one increments a potential difference according to Wikipedia.
When an eel spots a tasty prey, its brain orders the electrolytes to open their ion channels and allow sodium to flow through. The sudden difference in electrical potential generates an electric current, in a manner not unlike batteries with stacked plates.
An electric eel controls its victim’s nervous system with electrical pulses, and can even make it to move to reveal its location. Shocks to humans are rarely fatal. However, we have heard they are most unpleasant as if touching an electric fence.
So What Could Batteries Learn from Smart Eels?
Institute of Mechanical Engineers says a team of scientists from United States and Switzerland are exploring possibilities. That’s because they hope a soft, flexible battery could power medical implants and soft robots from inside them. Their soft cell design uses hydrogel and salt, to form an artificial electric organ to generate electricity.
This could “produce enough power to run small medical devices such as pacemakers, health monitor implants, medication dispensers, and augmented-reality contact lenses”. They even optimistically imagine generating electricity from inside a body using “naturally occurring processes” However, it seems the team are experiencing some uphill.
A member from University of Fribourg says “The electric organs in eels are incredibly sophisticated. They’re far better at generating power than we are.” So it seems electric eels could give batteries a few more tips in future.
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