TY - JOUR

T1 - Visual interpolation for contour completion by the European cuttlefish (Sepia officinalis) and its use in dynamic camouflage

AU - Zylinski, Sarah

AU - Darmaillacq, Anne-Sophie

AU - Shashar, Nadav

PY - 2012/6/22

Y1 - 2012/6/22

N2 - Cuttlefish rapidly change their appearance in order to camouflage on a given background in response to visual parameters, giving us access to their visual perception. Recently, it was shown that isolated edge information is sufficient to elicit a body pattern very similar to that used when a whole object is present. Here, we examined contour completion in cuttlefish by assaying body pattern responses to artificial backgrounds of 'objects' formed from fragmented circles, these same fragments rotated on their axis, and with the fragments scattered over the background, as well as positive (full circles) and negative (homogenous background) controls. The animals displayed similar responses to the full and fragmented circles, but used a different body pattern in response to the rotated and scattered fragments. This suggests that they completed the broken circles and recognized them as whole objects, whereas rotated and scattered fragments were instead interpreted as small, individual objects in their own right. We discuss our findings in the context of achieving accurate camouflage in the benthic shallow-water environment.

AB - Cuttlefish rapidly change their appearance in order to camouflage on a given background in response to visual parameters, giving us access to their visual perception. Recently, it was shown that isolated edge information is sufficient to elicit a body pattern very similar to that used when a whole object is present. Here, we examined contour completion in cuttlefish by assaying body pattern responses to artificial backgrounds of 'objects' formed from fragmented circles, these same fragments rotated on their axis, and with the fragments scattered over the background, as well as positive (full circles) and negative (homogenous background) controls. The animals displayed similar responses to the full and fragmented circles, but used a different body pattern in response to the rotated and scattered fragments. This suggests that they completed the broken circles and recognized them as whole objects, whereas rotated and scattered fragments were instead interpreted as small, individual objects in their own right. We discuss our findings in the context of achieving accurate camouflage in the benthic shallow-water environment.

KW - Adaptation, Biological

KW - Analysis of Variance

KW - Animals

KW - Color

KW - Form Perception

KW - France

KW - Pattern Recognition, Visual

KW - Photic Stimulation

KW - Sepia

KW - Vision, Ocular

KW - Comparative Study

KW - Journal Article

KW - Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

KW - Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

U2 - 10.1098/rspb.2012.0026

DO - 10.1098/rspb.2012.0026

M3 - Article

C2 - 22337697

VL - 279

SP - 2386

EP - 2390

JO - Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

JF - Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

SN - 0962-8452

IS - 1737

ER -