Hanlon and Mathger: MBL Senior Scientist Roger Hanlon and Assistant Research Scientist Lydia Mäthger test the ability of a cuttlefish to adapt to a disruptive background pattern. Photo by T. Kleindinst. |
Camouflage
expert Roger Hanlon of the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) is
co-recipient of a $6 million grant from the Office of Naval Research to
study and ultimately emulate the exquisite ability of some marine
animals to instantly change their skin color and pattern to blend into
their environment.
Hanlon,
who has spent more than three decades studying the camouflage artistry
of squid, octopus, and cuttlefish (a class of animals known as the
cephalopods), is collaborating with materials scientists and
nanotechnologists at Rice University toward the goal of developing
materials that can mimic cephalopod camouflage.
“Our
internal name for this project is ‘squid skin,’ but it is really about
fundamental research,” says Naomi Halas, an expert in nano-optics at
Rice University and the principal investigator on the four-year grant.
“Our deliverable is knowledge, the basic discoveries that will allow us
to make materials that are observant, adaptive, and responsive to their
environment.”
In
2008, Hanlon and MBL colleagues Lydia Mäthger and Steven Roberts
discovered that cephalopod skin contains opsins, the same type of
light-sensing proteins that function in the eyes.
“This
project will enable us to explore an exciting new avenue of vision
research – distributed light sensing throughout the skin,” Hanlon says.
“How and where that visual information is used by the nervous system is
likely to uncover some novel neural circuitry.”
Hanlon
and his team will perform experiments with cephalopods to determine how
opsin molecules receive light and aid the animal’s visual system in
adjusting skin patterns for communication and camouflage. A wide range
of techniques will be used to accomplish these aims. The MBL team, which
includes scientists Mäthger and Alan Kuzurian, will be collaborating
with marine biologist Thomas Cronin of the University of Maryland,
Baltimore County, on these investigations.
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“This
is inherently a multidisciplinary problem,” Halas says. “What can we,
as engineers, learn from the way these animals perceive light and
color?” The project team’s engineers will focus on emulating cephalopod
skin using new metamaterials—materials that blur the line between
material and machine.
The
Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) is dedicated to scientific discovery
and improving the human condition through research and education in
biology, biomedicine, and environmental science. Founded in 1888 in
Woods Hole, Massachusetts, the MBL is an independent, nonprofit
corporation.
Related studies
Mäthger,
L.M., Roberts, S. and Hanlon, R.T. 2010. Evidence for distributed light
sensing in the skin of cuttlefish, Sepia officinalis. Biology Letters
6: 600-603. (PDF)
Mäthger,
L.M., Denton, E.J., Marshall, J. and Hanlon, R.T. 2009. Mechanisms and
behavioral functions of structural coloration in cephalopods. Journal of
the Royal Society Interface 6: S149-S164. (PDF)
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Sutherland,
R. L., Mäthger, L. M., Hanlon, R. T., Urbas, A. M., Stone, M. O. 2008.
Cephalopod coloration model. I. Squid chromatophores and iridophores.
Journal of the Optical Society of America, 25 (3): 588-599. (PDF)
Mäthger,
L.M., and Hanlon, R.T. 2007. Malleable skin coloration in cephalopods:
selective reflectance, transmission and absorbance of light by
chromatophores and iridophores. Cell and Tissue Research 329: 179-186. (PDF)