Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio. Hey
Speaker 1: brain Stuff. I'm Lauren vogel Bomb, and today's episode is
Speaker 1: another classic from our archives. I'm fascinated by cephalopods, the
Speaker 1: category of animals that includes creatures like squid, octopuses, and cuttlefish,
Speaker 1: so I'm always excited when new research pops up about them.
Speaker 1: Today's classic deals with exactly that, Hey brain Stuff, Lauren
Speaker 1: vogel Bomb. Here cuttlefish. These cephalopods, known for their stunning
Speaker 1: ability to instantly change color and texture to blend into
Speaker 1: their surroundings, have another newly discovered trick. Researchers have found
Speaker 1: that these squidgy creatures can freeze their camouflage palette and
Speaker 1: lock it in place for up to an hour without
Speaker 1: any energy consuming input from their main nervous system. That
Speaker 1: superpower allows them to hold their disguise for long periods
Speaker 1: to avoid being detected and thus to avoid being eaten.
Speaker 1: It also helps them snatch their own prey, as they
Speaker 1: can remain essentially invisible as they lie in wait. The finding,
Speaker 1: published in the journal I Science, not only reveals yet
Speaker 1: another clever strategy of these ocean floor dwelling masters of disguise.
Speaker 1: It also lends further guidance for engineers hoping to borrow
Speaker 1: from the animal's tricks to develop new technologies, such as
Speaker 1: maps that can spring into three dimensions and soft bodied
Speaker 1: robots that could, say, wrap around a human leg to
Speaker 1: provide support. As with many discoveries, scientists stumbled upon this
Speaker 1: one nearly by accident. The researchers were working at the
Speaker 1: Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. They were trying
Speaker 1: to trace how the cuttlefish's nervous system directs its skin
Speaker 1: to transform its three D texture within seconds to blend
Speaker 1: into the background of say kelp or a rock. When
Speaker 1: they sliced through one of the two main nerves that
Speaker 1: runs along the side of a cuttle fish, they expected
Speaker 1: the animal would lose its camouflage on the corresponding side
Speaker 1: of that nerve, but instead, the three dimensional texture provided
Speaker 1: by nodes on the skin of the cuttle fish, called papala,
Speaker 1: stayed intact. We spoke with Trevor Wardill, co author of
Speaker 1: the study and a neuroscientist at the University of Cambridge.
Speaker 1: He said, it was really quite surprising in fact, when
Speaker 1: we first saw it. Generally, when you cut input to
Speaker 1: a muscle. It just relaxes and that's the end of it.
Speaker 1: We thought we did something wrong, but repeat takes of
Speaker 1: the procedures showed the phenomenon was no fluke the animals,
Speaker 1: by the way, we're not killed by the procedure and
Speaker 1: we're able to continue swimming and feeding in a tank
Speaker 1: at the MBL facility. The team's finding is the first
Speaker 1: time this kind of lock or catch muscle, as it's known,
Speaker 1: has been detected in any cephalopod. Wardell says they believe
Speaker 1: it's similar to a kind of locking mechanism used by
Speaker 1: clams and muscles to seal shut without expending energy. For
Speaker 1: the cuttle fish, which, as any wild animal, relies on
Speaker 1: every calorie it consumes to survive, having a way to
Speaker 1: maintain its disguise without constantly pumping out energy is an
Speaker 1: ingenious survival strategy. Like an e reader that only uses
Speaker 1: energy when you turn the page, you expend way less
Speaker 1: energy than with a tablet that's constantly refreshing its screen.
Speaker 1: The researchers suspect that squid, which hang out in the
Speaker 1: ocean's upper water columns, may have the same ability. Squid
Speaker 1: don't transform the texture of their skin as cuttlefish do
Speaker 1: likely because the increase in drag would make such rough
Speaker 1: surfaces more of a liability than an advantage. But these
Speaker 1: cephalopods blend in by shifting the ear doesn't quality of
Speaker 1: their skin, effectively changing how the sun's light reflects off
Speaker 1: of their bodies. Observations have shown that squid even use
Speaker 1: their eardescence to hypnotize prey such as crabs, in their sites.
Speaker 1: In investigating the cuttlefish's neurotransmitters, they found striking similarities to
Speaker 1: neural circuits used by squid to manipulate their eardescence, so
Speaker 1: they suspect squid may have a similar ability to lock
Speaker 1: in a certain air doescent to look. Wardell said the
Speaker 1: same nerve controls appear to control papelae in cuttlefish and
Speaker 1: aridescence in squid. We suspect they must have a common
Speaker 1: ancestor for this control system, but the jury is still out.
Speaker 1: Ordered that scientists have uncovered yet another neat cephalopod trick
Speaker 1: is exciting news to people like James Pickle, and Assistant
Speaker 1: Professor in the Partment of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics
Speaker 1: at the University of Pennsylvania. Pickle's research group recently borrowed
Speaker 1: from previous studies on the cephalopods to mimic the cuttlefish's
Speaker 1: quick changing textural camouflage in synthetic form using silicon and
Speaker 1: fiber mesh rings. He envisions building on the cuttlefish's dynamic
Speaker 1: texture changing ability to generate a GPS map that could
Speaker 1: lie flat in a vehicle and then, upon command, spring
Speaker 1: into three dimensions to offer a vivid, fully contoured view
Speaker 1: of the driver's route. Pickle also predicts endless medical applications
Speaker 1: that could borrow from the cephalopod, including soft robots that
Speaker 1: could instantly bend and conform to mold around a patient's
Speaker 1: injury or even envelope and support a beating heart. To
Speaker 1: accomplish those visions, Pickle foreseas taking inspiration and guidance from
Speaker 1: the cuttlefish and then advancing it. He conceives, for example,
Speaker 1: of developing individual artificial papillae that could not only be
Speaker 1: activated or deactivated to match surrounding, but also be prompted
Speaker 1: to take on a specific shape to create a surface
Speaker 1: that's even more fine tuned. The latest research on the
Speaker 1: cuttle fish was funded by the Air Force Office of
Speaker 1: scientific research. Wardille points out that the military's interest in
Speaker 1: the animals goes beyond camouflage. He said, they're also interested
Speaker 1: because of material science. You can imagine you can take
Speaker 1: a very flat structure and by activating it fom a
Speaker 1: three dimensional shape. That ability could be really helpful if
Speaker 1: you need to transport a structure flat to a location
Speaker 1: and then expanded out. Pickle said, nature has already begun
Speaker 1: the design process, so we don't have to start at zero,
Speaker 1: but ultimately we want to go beyond what even these
Speaker 1: amazing animals can do. Today's episode was originally produced by
Speaker 1: Tristan McNeil and is based on the article Cuddlefish Masters
Speaker 1: of Camouflage have a newly discovered superpower on how stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot Com, written by Amanda Onion. Brain Stuff is
Speaker 1: production of I Heart Radio in partnership with how stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot Com and is produced by Tyler Clay. Four
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