Fig. 8.

Fig. 8.

Summary of the surfacing behavior of wild-type and lateral line-deficient zebrafish larvae. (A) Wild-type larvae use their lateral line hair cells (in green) to mediate interactions with the air–water interface during surfacing. As a result of accurate surface detection, larvae take in an appropriate volume of air for swim bladder (SB) inflation and achieve neutral buoyancy. (B) Larvae with a genetic loss of lateral line function (hair cells in white) misinterpret the air–water interface, leading to increased interactions with the surface. Consequently, lateral line mutants (lhfpl5b^−/−) take in an excess volume of air, resulting in hyperinflation of the swim bladder for approximately half of mutant larvae. Selective chemical ablations of the head neuromasts produced similar results, implicating the anterior lateral line as the primary sensory organ for interactions with the air–water interface during the surfacing behavior.