BARRELEYE FISH: See-Through Fish Caught In Photos (SLIDESHOW, VIDEO)

Every now and then, nature serves up a weird animal that you can't not stare at. Well, here's one for you -- the barreleye fish, with its funky transparent face:

Researchers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute recently solved the half-century-old mystery of a fish with tubular eyes and a transparent head. Ever since the "barreleye" fish Macropinna microstoma was first described in 1939, marine biologists have known that it's tubular eyes are very good at collecting light. However, the eyes were believed to be fixed in place and seemed to provide only a "tunnel-vision" view of whatever was directly above the fish's head. A new paper by Bruce Robison and Kim Reisenbichler shows that these unusual eyes can rotate within a transparent shield that covers the fish's head. This allows the barreleye to peer up at potential prey or focus forward to see what it is eating.

Check out these photos of the barreleye:

• • • • • From MBARI: The barreleye (Macropinna microstoma) has extremely light-sensitive eyes that can rotate within a transparent, fluid-filled shield on its head.

It had been difficult to figure out what these fish actually looked like in life because catching them and keeping them in tact were mutually exclusive, until recently:

Most existing descriptions and illustrations of this fish do not show its fluid-filled shield, probably because this fragile structure was destroyed when the fish were brought up from the deep in nets. However, Robison and Reisenbichler were extremely fortunate--they were able to bring a net-caught barreleye to the surface alive, where it survived for several hours in a ship-board aquarium. Within this controlled environment, the researchers were able to confirm what they had seen in the ROV video--the fish rotated its tubular eyes as it turned its body from a horizontal to a vertical position.

MBARI also captured video of this strange creature. WATCH:

Comments

[johnie2xs]

02:25 PM on 03/03/2009

It's amazing how I can see the hand of God, in a creature like this and exult in it. And at the same time can understand the importance of science and the mysteries it unravels. Holding both these ideas in my mind at the same time, without contradiction, one of the other, makes me two things.
Human, and a progressive.
Yes, I admit it. I'm a Democrat ;).

[AZ4thatone]

11:40 AM on 03/01/2009

Simply wonderous!

[anthonytaurus]

09:46 AM on 03/01/2009

wow.. crazy that we spend billions of dollars looking into space while we don't even know our own planet yet.

[KayWrites]

04:04 PM on 02/26/2009

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. -Hamlet

Freaky cool! -Kay

[izmunuti]

02:57 PM on 02/26/2009

Mesmerizing! And fragile looking. Would be cool to see it capture food from a jellyfish.

[forpeace]

11:01 PM on 02/25/2009

*

WOW ........... I've never seen anything like this before!!!!!

It's amazing and cute too.

*

[Deepscan]

08:50 PM on 02/25/2009

As a creationist I see no problem here. So what would everyone like to argue with me about this species? There are more unique life forms than this waiting to be discovered. Oh yes by the way, Darwin became a Christain in his later years.

[Exusian]

01:13 PM on 02/26/2009

Darwin was a Christian long before he decided not to become an Anglican country Parson and instead to sail on the Beagle as ship's naturalist, and he remained a Christian throughout his entire life.

There is no inherent incompatibility between Christianity and belief in God vs science and the theory of evolution, there is only incompatibility between religious dogma and literalism vs science and evolution.

[Realityism]

05:56 PM on 02/26/2009

The majority of Christian denominations do not promote Creationism, but rather acknowledge the evolutionary process as the work of God. Darwin becoming Christian does not mean he rejected his theory.

You belong to a small and loud subset of Christians, which include those who came up with such theological anomolies as "the rapture," a concept invented in 19th century America.

[Deepscan]

08:30 PM on 02/25/2009

I'm a creationist, so what's the problem?

[Subterfuge]

12:26 PM on 02/26/2009

Deprecated eye sockets.

[jnik]

03:14 PM on 02/25/2009

Dam! I'd have sworn those nostrils were its eyes! But I can't recall a fish with eyes in front of its face, either!
Wonder how it tastes? ( In your face, PETA)!

[SamKnause]

01:55 PM on 02/25/2009

If you weren't already buzzed you would be after seeing a fish like that. That is truly the strangest of all the fish I have ever seen. I'll good one step further and include animals in on the list. What a wild and strange imagination you would have to have to think up that fish. Truly unbelievable.

[crayola 08]

01:13 PM on 02/25/2009

wow! that's truly amazing. sometimes i wonder if we really will be shocked at what alien life looks like when we find it because we have some pretty mind-blowing forms of life right here on our own planet.

[mamacat]

10:24 AM on 02/25/2009

I wish Darwin could have seen this fish. I think he would have laughed out loud.

[Tommygun264]

10:28 PM on 02/24/2009

Man, that is one freaky looking fish. So VERY COOL!

[Exusian]

07:39 PM on 02/24/2009

So much for the creationist argument that eyes are too complex an organ to have developed independently of divine design.

[Anonnie Muss]

08:21 AM on 02/25/2009

I will never understand why people like you feel as if it is worthwhile to try to argue with creationists. You wouldn't try to reason with a small child who told you they passionately believed in the tooth fairy, would you? Maybe you would. I wouldn't, and I don't see why creationists should be taken any more seriously. I feel like it is giving those nutbags far too much legitimacy to treat them as being worthy of arguing with. They have bizarre, wildly out of touch views and ought to be treated accordingly. And everything for them is about faith, not about facts that can be argued, so it's not as if you'll ever get anywhere.

[StringOfLights]

02:03 PM on 02/27/2009

Because they're mucking up science education in schools.

[Exusian]

01:28 PM on 02/25/2009

Funny, I don't see any creationists around here to argue with.
So your point was?

[Deepscan]

08:42 PM on 02/25/2009

I'm a creationist so what's the problem??

[V4Vendetta]

03:28 PM on 02/24/2009

Isn't nature amazing?