The tuna swings its tail vigorously in a saucepan after thawing under hot running water using the raw fish preservation method commonly used in Japan.
filmed at a market in Japan and posted to Facebook Pro Fishing on Nov. 28, a man who put the fish in a bucket of rubble, according to Long Room. The camera faces the right corner and a close-up of the thermometer shows that the temperature inside the cooler is -2.1 degrees Celsius.
The fish is then removed from the barrel and placed in a plastic tub filled with lukewarm water, where it stands still for about two seconds. The man lightly touched the fish’s tail, trying to rotate his body under the hot water. The fish began to wag their tail vigorously and to struggle, causing water to splash.
According to experts at the National Oceanic Aquarium in Plymouth, England, the fish in the video is likely to belong to the tuna family. It certainly didn’t freeze completely, but only covered with crushed rock at -2.1 degrees Celsius for a short time. Fish can survive this threshold of intense cold because in their body they have anticoagulant proteins.
The video posted on the Pro Fishing page has attracted nearly 55,000 views since its publication. Some viewers believe the video is a product of staging or the cruel treatment of animals. But in fact, it is a very popular method of preserving raw fish in Japan.
The fish are frozen enough to slow their heart rate but not kill them. This makes the fish meat fresh and soft for use in Japanese dishes like shashimi. Cold-water fish that live in cold seas have anticoagulants in their blood to help the body resist freezing temperatures, a feature common in Antarctic fish, according to a study published in 2004 by Queen’s University. , in Canada. Seawater freezes at -22 ° C due to the salt content, known as freezing point depletion.
Fish are also cold blooded, so their metabolic rate can be slowed down to almost undetectable. Because fish are relatively small, they can gradually warm up their bodies at a faster rate than other species, like the fish in the video. However, experts point out that this method of preservation can put pressure on the fish. Freezing and thawing more than once will kill it.
In January 2016, Japanese researchers resuscitated a frozen 30-year-old water bear. The animal even laid 19 eggs and 14 of them hatched successfully.
