Newly classified Danionella cerebrum hides in plain sight
Scientists identify and name new fish species around the globe practically every week. Some turn up in unlikely places like the soil of riverbanks. Some display characteristics and behaviors that are not what most people would call fish-like, such as not having fins and breathing through their skin rather than gills.
But it is rare for an unidentified and unnamed fish to have played such an important role in scientific research for several years before being officially identified and named.
Kevin Conway, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Ecology and Conservation Biology and curator of fishes at the Biodiversity Research and Teaching Collections in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Texas A&M University, Bryan-College Station, is among a team of three international scientists from Germany, Switzerland and the U.S. who have discovered and classified a fish that has been swimming in the tanks of neuroscientists for years.