Sometimes, science is helped not by a supercomputer, but by TikTok. Researchers noticed videos in the social network showing a pale fish pulled from a well near the border between India and Nepal. The fish turned out to be not just unusual, but unknown to science.
They conducted expeditions and found that it was not merely a new species, but a representative of a new genus: Gangaichthys indonepalicus. The researchers examined 15 wells and pumped about 2,500 liters of water. As a result, they found a tiny fish a little over 40 mm long, almost transparent.
The key feature is that this is the first known “rain eel,” which appears to spend its entire life in underground waters.
It turns out that TikTok sometimes can lead scientists to places the science community had not reached—down to the bottom of an ordinary well.
Source: StudyFinds
