Just in time for Shark Week, Discover reports that sharks are tearing up fiber-optic cables at the bottom of the ocean, forcing internet companies like Google to protect the cables with a material resembling Kevlar.
Here's why the predators are attracted to the cables:
Sharks have an uncanny ability to sense electromagnetic fields in the water using tiny detectors in their snouts called ampullae of Lorenzini. The organs, which look like freckles, sense even minute changes to electrical fields in the water, helping sharks find prey, navigate... or locate fiber-optic cables. [Discover]
No word yet on whether Megalodon is involved.
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