Sophisticated Sonar

Let me introduce you to an animal that lives in the Arctic Ocean, spending much of its time under the pack ice. This animal has a refined sonar that is so intense and so directional that it can narrow or widen the sonar beam to find prey over short and long distances. The sound beams are asymmetric, narrowing on the top which minimizes noise clutter coming from the surface of the ocean or from the pack ice it swims under.

This is the most sophisticated sonar observed in a living species, and the animal that possesses it is the narwhal. The mechanism that generates the sonar is like that of a porpoise with clicks being emitted by the animal. The narwhal can do things that no other animal can do. Because narwhals can scan vertically as they dive, they always know where open patches of water exist so they can get back to a place where they can breathe.

Animals live everywhere on earth, but some places like the Arctic Ocean pose significant problems. Not only are there the obvious problems of cold, darkness, and hundreds of square miles of pack ice but the narwhal’s food is spread out over the entire Arctic area. Locating food would be virtually impossible without some specialized equipment, and the narwhal has a tool that humans have only learned to apply to similar situations in recent years. Everywhere we look in the creation we see that a wonder-working hand has gone before. Data from Plos One researcher’s report for November 9, 2016.
–Jnohn N. Clayton © 2017