From Science Daily:
Researchers from New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) have identified unique anatomical features in a species of blind, walking cavefish in Thailand that enable the fish to walk and climb waterfalls in a manner comparable to tetrapods, or four-footed mammals and amphibians.
The discovery of this capability, not seen in any other living fishes, also has implications for understanding how the anatomy that all species need to walk on land evolved after the transition from finned to limbed appendages in the Devonian period, which began some 420 million years ago. More.
Actually, it won’t help us understand how the anatomy evolved because that is a historical question. What’s really interesting is that so many fish could have had the anatomy but don’t.
Note: Another type of walking fish, not to be confused with this one.
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