Journal ArticleBiology letters · December 2024
Talitrid amphipods are an extensively studied system for navigation due to their robust ability to navigate back to the optimal burrowing zone after foraging and could be a model system in which to study the impacts of collective behaviour on short-distanc ...
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Journal ArticleNature communications · November 2024
Many animals convergently evolved photosynthetic symbioses. In bivalves, giant clams (Cardiidae: Tridacninae) gape open to irradiate their symbionts, but heart cockles (Cardiidae: Fraginae) stay closed because sunlight passes through transparent windows in ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · August 2024
Signal theory predicts organisms should evolve signals that are conspicuous to intended receivers in natural signalling environments. Cleaner shrimps remove ectoparasites from reef fish clients and many signal their intent to clean by whipping long, white ...
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Journal ArticleBehavioral Ecology and Sociobiology · August 1, 2024
The previous version of this manuscript had the majority of the figure captions from Figs. 2 and 3 cut off and placed into the Methods section (c) and the Results section (b), respectively. The original article has been corrected. ...
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Journal ArticleTrends in ecology & evolution · February 2024
Color signals which mediate behavioral interactions across taxa and contexts are often thought of as color 'patches' - parts of an animal that appear colorful compared to other parts of that animal. Color patches, however, cannot be considered in isolation ...
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Journal ArticleBehavioral Ecology and Sociobiology · November 1, 2023
Brittle stars (Class Ophiuroidea), like all echinoderms, lack centralized nervous systems, having instead five radially arranged nerve cords joined by a central nerve ring. Although operant and classical conditioning have been demonstrated in a limited num ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · October 2023
Vertebrates and cephalopods are the two major animal groups that view the world through sophisticated camera-type eyes. There are of course exceptions: nautiloid cephalopods have more simply built pinhole eyes. Excellent camera type eyes are also found in ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of comparative physiology. A, Neuroethology, sensory, neural, and behavioral physiology · September 2023
Eyes in low-light environments typically must balance sensitivity and spatial resolution. Vertebrate eyes with large "pixels" (e.g., retinal ganglion cells with inputs from many photoreceptors) will be sensitive but provide coarse vision. Small pixels can ...
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Journal ArticleEcology and evolution · September 2023
Carotenoid pigments are the basis for much red, orange, and yellow coloration in nature and central to visual signaling. However, as pigment concentration increases, carotenoid signals not only darken and become more saturated but they also redshift; for e ...
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Journal ArticleNature communications · August 2023
Dynamic color change has evolved multiple times, with a physiological basis that has been repeatedly linked to dermal photoreception via the study of excised skin preparations. Despite the widespread prevalence of dermal photoreception, both its physiology ...
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Journal ArticleThe Biological bulletin · February 2023
AbstractCounterillumination is a camouflage strategy employed primarily by mesopelagic fishes, sharks, crustaceans, and squid, which use ventral bioluminescence to obscure their silhouettes when viewed from below. Although certain counterilluminating speci ...
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Journal ArticleScience (New York, N.Y.) · December 2022
Transparency in animals is a complex form of camouflage involving mechanisms that reduce light scattering and absorption throughout the organism. In vertebrates, attaining transparency is difficult because their circulatory system is full of red blood cell ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · November 2022
Many animals use the geomagnetic field to migrate long distances with high accuracy; however, research has shown that individual responses to magnetic cues can be highly variable. Thus, it has been hypothesized that magnetoreception alone is insufficient f ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of fish biology · October 2022
Movement of fishes in the aquatic realm is fundamental to their ecology and survival. Movement can be driven by a variety of biological, physiological and environmental factors occurring across all spatial and temporal scales. The intrinsic capacity of mov ...
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Journal ArticleIntegrative and comparative biology · July 2022
Sea urchins do not have eyes, yet they are capable of resolving simple images. One suggestion as to the mechanism of this capability is that the spines shade off-axis light from reaching the photosensitive test (skeleton). Following this hypothesis, the de ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · June 2022
Colour signals of many animals are surrounded by a high-contrast achromatic background, but little is known about the possible function of this arrangement. For both humans and non-human animals, the background colour surrounding a colour stimulus affects ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · March 2022
Sönke Johnsen and Steve Haddock introduce the remarkable deep-sea fish Macropinna microstoma whose transparent head and rotating tubular eyes are two novel adaptations that allow it to see and hunt at depth. ...
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Journal ArticleEthology : formerly Zeitschrift fur Tierpsychologie · February 2022
Many animals use assessment signals to resolve contests over limited resources while minimizing the costs of those contests. The carotenoid-based orange to red bills of male zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata) are thought to function as assessment s ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of comparative physiology. A, Neuroethology, sensory, neural, and behavioral physiology · January 2022
Radio frequency electromagnetic noise (RF) of anthropogenic origin has been shown to disrupt magnetic orientation behavior in some animals. Two sources of natural RF might also have the potential to disturb magnetic orientation behavior under some conditio ...
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Chapter · January 1, 2022
This chapter discusses the use of light by aquatic organisms for visual and non-visual tasks that often enhance fitness. Variations in underwater light among inland waters as well as mechanisms of photoreception (i.e., light capture) are first described. T ...
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Journal ArticleEcology and evolution · December 2021
Predators can strongly influence disease transmission and evolution, particularly when they prey selectively on infected hosts. Although selective predation has been observed in numerous systems, why predators select infected prey remains poorly understood ...
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Journal ArticleDeep-Sea Research Part I: Oceanographic Research Papers · June 1, 2021
The legend of the “kraken” has captivated humans for millennia, yet our knowledge of the large deep-sea cephalopods that inspired this myth remains limited. Conventional methods for exploring the deep sea, including the use of nets, manned submersibles, an ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · April 2021
Visual perception is, in part, a function of the ambient illumination spectrum. In aquatic environments, illumination depends upon the water's optical properties and depth, both of which can change due to anthropogenic impacts: turbidity is increasing in m ...
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Journal ArticleArthropod structure & development · March 2021
Snapping shrimp (Alpheidae) are decapod crustaceans named for the snapping claws with which they produce cavitation bubbles. Snapping shrimp use the shock waves released by collapsing cavitation bubbles as weapons. Along with their distinctive claws, snapp ...
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Journal ArticleThe American naturalist · February 2021
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AbstractSensory systems are predicted to be adapted to the perception of important stimuli, such as signals used in communication. Prior work has shown that female zebra finches perceive the carotenoid-based orange-red coloration of male beaks-a mate choic ...
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Journal ArticleOptics and Photonics News · December 1, 2020
Ultra-black materials—those reflecting less than 0.5[%] of the light that hits them—can be used in telescopes, cameras and optical equipment to absorb stray light before it reaches the detector, or to improve light capture of absorbers such as solar panels ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of comparative physiology. A, Neuroethology, sensory, neural, and behavioral physiology · September 2020
Diverse animals use Earth's magnetic field to guide their movements, but the neural and molecular mechanisms underlying the magnetic sense remain enigmatic. One hypothesis is that particles of the mineral magnetite (Fe3O4) provide the ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · September 2020
At oceanic depths >200 m, there is little ambient sunlight, but bioluminescent organisms provide another light source that can reveal animals to visual predators and prey [1-4]. Transparency and mirrored surfaces-common camouflage strategies under the diff ...
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Journal ArticleEcology and evolution · September 2020
Darkness and low biomass make it challenging for animals to find and identify one another in the deep sea. While spatiotemporal variation in bioluminescence is thought to underlie mate recognition for some species, its role in conspecific recognition remai ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · September 2020
Diverse organisms use Earth's magnetic field as a cue in orientation and navigation. Nevertheless, eliciting magnetic orientation responses reliably, either in laboratory or natural settings, is often difficult. Many species appear to preferentially exploi ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · August 2020
Many vertebrates have distinctive blue-green bones and other tissues due to unusually high biliverdin concentrations-a phenomenon called chlorosis. Despite its prevalence, the biochemical basis, biology, and evolution of chlorosis are poorly understood. In ...
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Journal ArticleBehavioral Ecology and Sociobiology · July 1, 2020
Abstract: In the context of mate choice, males may vary continuously in their expression of assessment signals, typically reflecting information about variation in mate quality. Similarly, females may exhibit variation in mate preference, which could be du ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · June 2020
Counterillumination, the masking of an animal's silhouette with ventral photophores, is found in a number of mesopelagic taxa but is difficult to employ because it requires that the animal match the intensity of downwelling light without seeing its own ven ...
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Journal ArticleBehavioural processes · March 2020
Magnetoreception remains one of the most enigmatic of animal senses. Rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) represent an ideal species to study this sense, as magnetoreception based upon microscopic particles of magnetite is suspected to play an important rol ...
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Journal ArticleNature communications · March 2020
Recently, it has been shown that animals such as jumping spiders, birds, and butterflies have evolved ultra-black coloration comparable to the blackest synthetic materials. Of these, certain papilionid butterflies have reflectances approaching 0.2%, result ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · February 2020
Evidence from live gray whale strandings suggests that their navigation may be disrupted by increased radio frequency noise generated by solar storms, suggesting the potential for magnetoreception in this species. ...
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Journal ArticlePloS one · January 2020
The unique cellular organization and transparent function of the ocular lens depend on the continuous differentiation of immature epithelial cells on the lens anterior surface into mature elongated fiber cells within the lens core. A ubiquitous event durin ...
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Chapter · January 1, 2020
This review explores the physical properties of natural light, both celestial and bioluminescent, and its distribution in terrestrial and aquatic habitats. A description of the natural sources of light is followed by a discussion of the spatial, temporal, ...
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Journal ArticleIntegrative and comparative biology · December 2019
More than 100 years ago, the biologist Jakob von Uexküll suggested that, because sensory systems are diverse, animals likely inhabit different sensory worlds (umwelten) than we do. Since von Uexküll, work across sensory modalities has confirmed that animal ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of the Royal Society, Interface · October 2019
The bay scallop Argopecten irradians (Mollusca: Bivalvia) has dozens of iridescent blue eyes that focus light using mirror-based optics. Here, we test the hypothesis that these eyes appear blue because of photonic nanostructures that preferentially ...
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Journal ArticleBiology letters · September 2019
In cleaning mutualisms, small cleaner organisms remove ectoparasites and dead skin from larger clients. Because cheating by predatory clients can result in cleaner death, cleaners should assess the potential risk of interacting with a given client and adju ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of fish biology · July 2019
Rod spectral sensitivity data (λmax ), measured by microspectrophotometry, were compiled for 403 species of ray-finned fishes in order to examine four hypothesized predictors of rod spectral sensitivity (depth, habitat, diet and temperature). Fr ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · May 2019
Although perception begins when a stimulus is transduced by a sensory neuron, numerous perceptual mechanisms can modify sensory information as it is processed by an animal's nervous system. One such mechanism is categorical perception, in which (1) continu ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · February 2019
Most polarisation vision studies reveal elegant examples of how animals, mainly the invertebrates, use polarised light cues for navigation, course-control or habitat selection. Within the past two decades it has been recognised that polarised light, reflec ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · February 2019
Coleoid cephalopods show unique morphological and neural novelties, such as arms with tactile and chemosensory suckers and a large complex nervous system. The evolution of such cephalopod novelties has been attributed at a genomic level to independent gene ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · January 2019
For polarized light to inform behaviour, the typical range of degrees of polarization observable in the animal's natural environment must be above the threshold for detection and interpretation. Here, we present the first investigation of the degree of lin ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · November 2018
A major goal of sensory ecology is to identify factors that underlie sensory-trait variation. One open question centers on why fishes show the greatest diversity among vertebrates in their capacity to detect color (i.e. spectral sensitivity). Over the past ...
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Journal ArticleAmerican Biology Teacher · October 1, 2018
We present a novel laboratory activity to introduce students to experimental approaches often used by biologists to study orientation in animals. We first provide an overview of the current understanding of magnetoreception-the ability of some organisms to ...
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Journal ArticleNature · August 2018
In many contexts, animals assess each other using signals that vary continuously across individuals and, on average, reflect variation in the quality of the signaller1,2. It is often assumed that signal receivers perceive and respond continuousl ...
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Journal ArticleMarine Biology · July 1, 2018
The increased availability of genome sequences has provided remarkable advances in our understanding of the evolutionary history of non-model species. One important consideration in evolutionary studies is the role of demographic history in shaping contemp ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · July 2018
Like many birds [1], numerous species of nocturnal moths undertake spectacular long-distance migrations at night [2]. Each spring, billions of Bogong moths (Agrotis infusa) escape hot conditions in different regions of southeast Australia by making a highl ...
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Dataset · June 12, 2018
Categorical perception occurs when continuous variation in a stimulus (e.g., wavelength of color) is categorized by observers, with sharp changes in response occurring over a boundary and increased discrimination between stimuli that lie across a boundary ...
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Journal ArticleBiology letters · June 2018
The ability to perceive the Earth's magnetic field, or magnetoreception, exists in numerous animals. Although the mechanism underlying magnetoreception has not been clearly established in any species, in salmonid fish, it is hypothesized to occur by means ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · June 2018
Cleaner shrimp and their reef fish clients are an interspecific mutualistic interaction that is thought to be mediated by signals, and a useful system for studying the dynamics of interspecific signalling. To demonstrate signalling, one must show that purp ...
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Journal ArticleEnvironmental Biology of Fishes · May 1, 2018
A recent study identified candidate genes linked to magnetoreception in rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) by sequencing transcriptomes from the brains of fish exposed to a magnetic pulse. However, the discovery of these candidate genes was limited to seq ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of comparative physiology. A, Neuroethology, sensory, neural, and behavioral physiology · May 2018
Across diverse taxa, an increasing number of photoreceptive systems are being discovered in tissues outside of the eye, such as in the skin. Dermal photoreception is believed to serve a variety of functions, including rapid color change via specialized cel ...
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Journal ArticleTrends in ecology & evolution · May 2018
Acuity, the fineness with which sensory systems perceive and parse information, limits the information that organisms can extract from stimuli. Here, we focus on visual acuity (the ability to perceive static spatial detail) to discuss relationships between ...
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Journal ArticleMethods in Ecology and Evolution · March 1, 2018
Visual acuity is one of three basic parameters that characterize a visual system. However, few comparative studies of signals, camouflage and ecology in general have considered visual acuity. This is unfortunate, because humans have high acuity, and thus r ...
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Journal ArticleOceanography · December 1, 2017
Since its founding, the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) has pioneered unique capabilities for accessing the deep ocean and its inhabitants through focused peer relationships between scientists and engineers. This focus has enabled breakthr ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · November 2017
In studies of animal orientation, data are often represented as directions that can be analyzed using circular statistical methods. Although several circular statistical tests exist to detect the presence of a mean direction, likelihood-based approaches ma ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · November 2017
Whole-body transparency, an effective camouflage strategy in many aquatic species, can be disrupted by environmental and/or physiological stressors. We found that tail-flip escape responses temporarily disrupt the transparency of the anemone shrimp Ancy ...
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Journal ArticlePhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · July 2017
Fluorescence is a physico-chemical energy exchange where shorter-wavelength photons are absorbed by a molecule and are re-emitted as longer-wavelength photons. It has been suggested a means of communication in several taxa including flowers, pitcher plants ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · May 2017
Visual acuity (the ability to resolve spatial detail) is highly variable across fishes. However, little is known about the evolutionary pressures underlying this variation. We reviewed published literature to create an acuity database for 159 species of ra ...
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Journal ArticleBMC biology · May 2017
Senses connect organisms to both the world and to each other, yet there is much we don't know about them. Using examples drawn primarily from the author's subfield of vision research, this article discusses five major open questions. ...
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Journal ArticleBioinspiration & biomimetics · May 2017
Diverse taxa use Earth's magnetic field to aid both short- and long-distance navigation. Study of these behaviors has led to a variety of postulated sensory and processing mechanisms that remain unconfirmed. Although several models have been proposed to ex ...
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Journal ArticlePhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · April 2017
North Atlantic right whales (Eubalaena glacialis) feed during the spring and early summer in marine waters off the northeast coast of North America. Their food primarily consists of planktonic copepods, Calanus finmarchicus, which they consum ...
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Journal ArticlePhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · April 2017
The light environment of the mesopelagic realm of the ocean changes with both depth and viewer orientation, and this has probably driven the high diversity of visual adaptations found among its inhabitants. The mesopelagic 'cockeyed' squids of family Histi ...
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Journal ArticleBiology letters · April 2017
Diverse animals use Earth's magnetic field in orientation and navigation, but little is known about the molecular mechanisms that underlie magnetoreception. Recent studies have focused on two possibilities: (i) magnetite-based receptors; and (ii) biochemic ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent zoology · February 2017
RGB displays effectively simulate millions of colors in the eyes of humans by modulating the relative amount of light emitted by 3 differently colored juxtaposed lights (red, green, and blue). The relationship between the ratio of red, green, and blue ligh ...
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Journal ArticleIntegrative and comparative biology · November 2016
It has been recognized for decades that animals sense light using photoreceptors besides those that are devoted strictly to vision. However, the nature of these receptors, their molecular components, their physiological responses, and their biological func ...
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Journal ArticleIntegrative and comparative biology · November 2016
The eyes of scallops form images using a concave spherical mirror and contain two separate retinas, one layered on top of the other. Behavioral and electrophysiological studies indicate that the images formed by these eyes have angular resolutions of about ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · November 2016
Transparent zooplankton and nekton are often nearly invisible when viewed under ambient light in the pelagic zone [1-3]. However, in this environment, where the light field is directional (and thus likely to cause reflections), and under the bioluminescent ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · September 2016
Aggregation is a common life-history trait in open-water taxa. Qualitative understanding of how aggregation by prey influences their encounter rates with predators is critical for understanding pelagic predator-prey interactions and trophic webs. We extend ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · August 2016
Many arthropod species have evolved to thrive only on the leaves of a particular species of plant, which they must be capable of finding in order to survive accidental displacement, developmental transitions or the changing of the seasons. A number of stud ...
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Journal ArticleScience (New York, N.Y.) · August 2016
Brady et al (Reports, 20 November 2015, p. 965) claimed that the silvery sides of certain fish are cryptic when viewed by animals with polarization sensitivity, which they termed "polarocrypsis." After examining their evidence, we find this claim to be uns ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · August 2016
Although the function of polarization vision, the ability to discern the polarization characteristics of light, is well established in many terrestrial and benthic species, its purpose in pelagic species (squid and certain fish and crustaceans) is poorly u ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · June 2016
Colour vision and colour signals are important to aquatic animals, but light scattering and absorption by water distorts spectral stimuli. To investigate the performance of colour vision in water, and to suggest how photoreceptor spectral sensitivities and ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · March 2016
The measurement of color in biology has become increasingly common. These measurements are not limited to color vision research, but are also found in studies of communication, signaling, camouflage, evolution and behavior, and in the examination of enviro ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · March 2016
Humans use shading as a cue to three-dimensional form by combining low-level information about light intensity with high-level knowledge about objects and the environment. Here, we examine how cuttlefish Sepia officinalis respond to light and shadow to sha ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · February 2016
Cleaner shrimp (Decapoda) regularly interact with conspecifics and client reef fish, both of which appear colourful and finely patterned to human observers. However, whether cleaner shrimp can perceive the colour patterns of conspecifics and clients is unk ...
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Journal ArticleBehavioral Ecology · January 1, 2016
The iconic red hourglass of the black widow spiders (genus Latrodectus) is traditionally considered an aposematic signal, yet experimental evidence is lacking. Here, we present data that suggest that black widow coloration may have evolved to be an aposema ...
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Journal ArticlePLoS One · 2016
An unresolved issue in structural biology is how the encapsulated lens removes membranous organelles to carry out its role as a transparent optical element. In this ultrastructural study, we establish a mechanism for nuclear elimination in the developing c ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · December 2015
Cephalopods, and in particular the cuttlefish Sepia officinalis, are common models for studies of camouflage and predator avoidance behaviour. Preventing detection by predators is especially important to this group of animals, most of which are soft-bodied ...
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Journal ArticleArthropod-Plant Interactions · October 14, 2015
We present preliminary evidence for a novel evolutionary hypothesis, i.e., that animals living on plants high in antimicrobial secondary metabolites could, via drift or selection, evolve weakened immune defenses and an immunological dependence on the antim ...
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Journal ArticleBehavioral Ecology · February 11, 2015
Numerous animals are known to assess the resource holding potential of their opponents using conventional signals and other correlates of resource holding potential. Although body and weapon size generally correlate with resource holding potential and are ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · February 2015
The mesopelagic habitat is a vast space that lacks physical landmarks and is structured by depth, light penetration, and horizontal currents. Solar illumination is visible in the upper 1,000 m of the ocean, becoming dimmer and spectrally filtered with dept ...
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Journal ArticleApplied optics · February 2015
We measured downwelling spectral vector irradiance (from 350 to 800 nm) during evening civil and nautical twilight (solar elevation down to -12°). Nine sets of measurements were taken to cover the first half of the lunar cycle (from the new to full moon) a ...
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Journal ArticlePloS one · January 2015
Cuttlefish are cephalopods capable of rapid camouflage responses to visual stimuli. However, it is not always clear to what these animals are responding. Previous studies have found cuttlefish to be more responsive to lateral stimuli rather than substrate. ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of the Royal Society, Interface · September 2014
The 'disco' or 'electric' clam Ctenoides ales (Limidae) is the only species of bivalve known to have a behaviourally mediated photic display. This display is so vivid that it has been repeatedly confused for bioluminescence, but it is actually the result o ...
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Journal ArticleEvolution; international journal of organic evolution · August 2014
One classic explanation for the remarkable diversity of flower colors across angiosperms involves evolutionary shifts among different types of pollinators with different color preferences. However, the pollinator shift model fails to account for the many e ...
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Journal ArticleApplied optics · July 2014
Ray tracing, a computational method for tracing the trajectories of rays of light through matter, is often used to characterize mechanical or biological visual systems with aberrations that are larger than the effect of diffraction inherent in the system. ...
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Journal ArticleTrends in ecology & evolution · May 2014
Sensory information allows animals to interpret their environment and make decisions. The ways in which animals perceive and measure stimuli from the social and physical environment guide nearly every decision they make. Thus, sensory perception and associ ...
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Journal ArticlePhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · January 2014
Visual performance and visual interactions in pelagic animals are notoriously hard to investigate because of our restricted access to the habitat. The pelagic visual world is also dramatically different from benthic or terrestrial habitats, and our intuiti ...
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Journal ArticleLimnology and Oceanography · January 1, 2014
Many pelagic species, particularly teleost fish, have silvered lateral surfaces that are thought to primarily serve as a form of camouflage. The underlying argument is that the underwater light field is cylindrically symmetrical around the vertical axis; t ...
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Journal ArticleAnnual review of marine science · January 2014
Camouflage is exceptionally challenging in pelagic environments because of their featureless nature. Thus, it is perhaps no surprise that pelagic species have evolved highly sophisticated cryptic strategies, three of which-transparency, mirrors, and counte ...
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Journal ArticleExp Eye Res · November 2013
The purpose is to determine the nature of the cellular rearrangements occurring through the remodeling zone (RZ) in human donor lenses, identified previously by confocal microscopy to be about 100 μm from the capsule. Human donor lenses were fixed with 10% ...
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Journal ArticleEvolutionary Ecology · November 1, 2013
Private communication may benefit signalers by reducing the costs imposed by potential eavesdroppers such as parasites, predators, prey, or rivals. It is likely that private communication channels are influenced by the evolution of signalers, intended rece ...
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Journal ArticleVision research · November 2013
In the sea, visual scenes change dramatically with depth. At shallow and moderate depths (<1,000 m), there is enough light for animals to see the surfaces and shapes of prey, predators, and conspecifics. This changes below 1,000 m, where no downwelling day ...
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Journal ArticleExperimental eye research · November 2013
The eye lens consists of a layer of epithelial cells that overlay a series of differentiating fiber cells that upon maturation lose their mitochondria, nuclei and other organelles. Lens transparency relies on the metabolic function of mitochondria containe ...
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Journal ArticleBMC evolutionary biology · September 2013
BackgroundWe recently reported (Curr Biol 22:683-688, 2012) that the eyes of giant and colossal squid can grow to three times the diameter of the eyes of any other animal, including large fishes and whales. As an explanation to this extreme absolu ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · May 2013
In diverse and productive habitats, predaceous arthropods are expected to frequently encounter dangerous conspecifics and heterospecifics. This should make quick and accurate discriminations between species and sexes adaptive. By simultaneously sampling bo ...
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Journal ArticleMol Vis · 2013
PURPOSE: Increased use of phacoemulsification procedures for cataract surgeries has resulted in a dramatic decrease in the availability of cataractous nuclear specimens for basic research into the mechanism of human cataract formation. To overcome such dif ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of vision · November 2012
Vertebrates possess different types of retinal specializations that vary in number, size, shape, and position in the retina. This diversity in retinal configuration has been revealed through topographic maps, which show variations in neuron density across ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · October 2012
Bioluminescence is common and well studied in mesopelagic species. However, the extent of bioluminescence in benthic sites of similar depths is far less studied, although the relatively large eyes of benthic fish, crustaceans and cephalopods at bathyal dep ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · October 2012
Using new collecting techniques with the Johnson-Sea-Link submersible, eight species of deep-sea benthic crustaceans were collected with intact visual systems. Their spectral sensitivities and temporal resolutions were determined shipboard using electroret ...
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Journal ArticleExp Eye Res · August 2012
Human nuclear cataract formation is a multi-factorial disease with contributions to light scattering from many cellular sources that change their scattering properties over decades. The aging process produces aggregation of cytoplasmic crystallin proteins, ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · April 2012
In the blue crab, Callinectes sapidus, claw color varies by sex, sexual maturity and individual. Males rely in part on color cues to select appropriate mates, and these chromatic cues may be perceived through an opponent interaction between two photorecept ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · April 2012
Giant and colossal deep-sea squid (Architeuthis and Mesonychoteuthis) have the largest eyes in the animal kingdom [1, 2], but there is no explanation for why they would need eyes that are nearly three times the diameter of those of any other extant animal. ...
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Journal ArticleBehavioural processes · March 2012
Weaponry and color badges are commonly theorized to function as visual signals of aggressiveness or fighting ability. However, few studies have supported a signaling function of weaponry, and the role of color in invertebrate competitive interactions remai ...
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Journal ArticleThe Optics of Life: A Biologist's Guide to Light in Nature · January 19, 2012
Optics--a field of physics focusing on the study of light--is also central to many areas of biology, including vision, ecology, botany, animal behavior, neurobiology, and molecular biology.The Optics of Lifeintroduces the fundamentals of optics to biologis ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · November 2011
Animals in the lower mesopelagic zone (600-1,000 m depth) of the oceans have converged on two major strategies for camouflage: transparency and red or black pigmentation [1]. Transparency conveys excellent camouflage under ambient light conditions, greatly ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of the Royal Society, Interface · October 2011
Cephalopods possess a sophisticated array of mechanisms to achieve camouflage in dynamic underwater environments. While active mechanisms such as chromatophore patterning and body posturing are well known, passive mechanisms such as manipulating light with ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · September 2011
In crustaceans with compound eyes, the corneal lens of each facet is part of the exoskeleton and thus shed during molting. Here we used an optomotor assay to evaluate the impact of molting on visual acuity (as measured by the minimum resolvable angle, α(mi ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · April 2011
Hundreds of ocelli are embedded in the dorsal shell plates of certain chitons. These ocelli each contain a pigment layer, retina, and lens, but it is unknown whether they provide chitons with spatial vision. It is also unclear whether chiton lenses are mad ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · March 2011
There are dramatic and physiologically relevant changes in both skylight color and intensity during evening twilight as the pathlength of direct sunlight through the atmosphere increases, ozone increasingly absorbs long wavelengths and skylight becomes inc ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · March 2011
Transparency is an effective form of camouflage, but it must be present throughout the entire volume of an animal to succeed. Certain environmental stressors may cause physiological responses that increase internal light scattering, making tissue less tran ...
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Journal ArticlePhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · March 2011
Polarization sensitivity is documented in a range of marine animals. The variety of tasks for which animals can use this sensitivity, and the range over which they do so, are confined by the visual systems of these animals and by the propagation of the pol ...
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Journal ArticlePhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · March 2011
Because light in the pelagic environment is partially polarized, it has been suggested that the polarization sensitivity found in certain pelagic species may serve to enhance the contrast of their transparent zooplankton prey. We examined its potential dur ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · February 2011
Scallop eyes contain two retinas, one proximal and one distal. Molecular evidence suggests that each retina expresses a different visual pigment. To test whether these retinas have different spectral sensitivities, we used microspectrophotometry to measure ...
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Chapter · January 1, 2011
When we enter the marine environment as divers, snorkellers or even as television viewers, two things are immediately notable. We are supported by the water (or possibly armchair) ‘flying’ through a three-dimensional world, and we can't see very far. The l ...
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Journal ArticleExp Eye Res · December 2010
The goal of this project was to determine the relative refractive index (RI) of the interior of multilamellar bodies (MLBs) compared to the adjacent cytoplasm within human nuclear fiber cells. MLBs have been characterized previously as 1-4 μm diameter sphe ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · January 2010
Recent evidence that echinoids of the genus Echinometra have moderate visual acuity that appears to be mediated by their spines screening off-axis light suggests that the urchin Strongylocentrotus purpuratus, with its higher spine density, may have even mo ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · November 2009
Visual displays often play a large role in animal communication, particularly in sexual interactions. The blue crab Callinectes sapidus is both colorful and highly visually responsive, yet almost all studies of their courtship have focused on chemical cues ...
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Chapter · January 1, 2009
Biological receptors used to detect underwater light vary in structure, from simple clusters of cells that only detect light intensity to complex organs that form detailed images. While most aquatic organisms perceive some portion of the visible spectrum, ...
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Journal ArticleAmerican Malacological Bulletin · December 29, 2008
The unique, double-retina, concave mirror eyes of scallops are abundant along the valve mantle margins. Scallops have the most acute vision among the bivalve molluscs, but little is known about how eyes vary between scallop species. We examined eye morphol ...
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Journal ArticleCurrent biology : CB · December 2008
One of the strongest paleontological arguments in favor of the origin of bilaterally symmetrical animals (Bilateria) prior to their obvious and explosive appearance in the fossil record in the early Cambrian, 542 million years ago, is the occurrence of tra ...
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Journal ArticleExp Eye Res · August 2008
The primary goal was to characterize the structural alterations that occur at the fiber cell interfaces in nuclei of fully opaque cataracts removed by extracapsular cataract surgery in India. The dark yellow to brunescent nuclei, ages 38-78 years, were pro ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · July 2008
The unique eyes of scallops are abundant along the right and left valve mantle margins. These eyes form images by reflection off a concave spherical mirror, and give scallops an angular resolution of around 2 degrees , far better than the 13-40 degrees ang ...
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Journal ArticleMol Vis · March 24, 2008
PURPOSE: Multilamellar bodies (MLBs) are lipid-coated spheres (1-4 microm in diameter) found with greater frequency in the nuclear region of human age-related cataracts compared with human transparent lenses. Mie light scattering calculations have demonstr ...
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Journal ArticlePhysics Today · March 11, 2008
Like the theory of plate tectonics, the idea that animals can detect Earth's magnetic field has traveled the path from ridicule to well-established fact in little more than one generation. Dozens of experiments have now shown that diverse animal species, r ...
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Journal ArticleExp Eye Res · February 2008
Alterations in ultrastructural features of the lens fiber cells lead to scattering and opacity typical of cataracts. The organelle-free cytoplasm of the lens nuclear fiber cell is one such component that contains vital information about the packing and org ...
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Journal ArticleIntegrative and comparative biology · December 2007
Oceanography has seen the recent development of many new tools and techniques. The subfield of pelagic visual ecology in particular has benefited from the development of more reliable, portable, and economic tools and techniques that can be taken to sea in ...
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Journal ArticleIntegrative and comparative biology · December 2007
The pelagic realm of the ocean is characterized by extremely clear water and a lack of surfaces. Adaptations to the visual ecology of this environment include transparency, fluorescence, bioluminescence, and deep red or black pigmentation. While the signal ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · November 2007
Light scattering by zooplankton was investigated as a major factor undermining transparency camouflage in these pelagic animals. Zooplankton of differing transparencies--including the hyperiid amphipod Anchylomera blossevillei, an unknown gammarid amphipod ...
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Journal ArticleBehavioral Ecology and Sociobiology · October 1, 2007
The Hamilton-Zuk hypothesis proposes that females prefer male secondary sexual traits because they are honest indicators of parasite resistance. Despite the attention that this hypothesis has received, its role in sexual selection remains equivocal. This s ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · September 2007
Dozens of experiments on magnetosensitive, migratory birds have shown that their magnetic orientation behavior depends on the spectrum of light under which they are tested. However, it is not certain whether this is due to a direct effect on the magnetorec ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of the Royal Society, Interface · August 2007
A lens with a graded refractive index is required for vision in aquatic animals with camera-type eyes. This optical design entails a radial gradient of protein density, with low density in external layers and high density in internal layers. To maintain th ...
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Journal ArticleInvest Ophthalmol Vis Sci · January 2007
PURPOSE: To employ Mie scattering theory to predict the light-scattering from micrometer-sized particles surrounded by lipid shells, called multilamellar bodies (MLBs), reported in human age-related nuclear cataracts. METHODS: Mie scattering theory is appl ...
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Journal ArticleCanadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences · October 1, 2006
Ultraviolet (UV) photoreceptors have been reported in a wide variety of freshwater and marine organisms, suggesting that UV vision is prominent in aquatic ecosystems. However, its adaptive significance remains speculative. The present study tested whether ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · May 2006
We tested the hypothesis that polarization sensitivity enhances the detection of moving, transparent objects by examining the escape response of the red swamp crayfish (Procambarus clarkii Girard) from a visual threat. A transparent, birefringent target tr ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · March 2006
Recent studies have shown that certain nocturnal insect and vertebrate species have true color vision under nocturnal illumination. Thus, their vision is potentially affected by changes in the spectral quality of twilight and nocturnal illumination, due to ...
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Journal ArticleNature reviews. Neuroscience · September 2005
Diverse animals can detect magnetic fields but little is known about how they do so. Three main hypotheses of magnetic field perception have been proposed. Electrosensitive marine fish might detect the Earth's field through electromagnetic induction, but d ...
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Journal ArticleIntegrative and comparative biology · April 2005
The colors of deep-sea species are generally assumed to be cryptic, but it is not known how cryptic they are and under what conditions. This study measured the color of approximately 70 deep-sea species, both pelagic and benthic, and compared the results w ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · November 2004
Although eyes are generally considered necessary for image resolution, a diffuse photoreceptive system with directional sensitivity may also have this ability. Two species of the echinoid genus Echinometra were tested for spatial vision by examining their ...
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Journal ArticleExp Eye Res · October 2004
PURPOSE: To characterize multilamellar bodies (MLBs), determine their distribution along the optic axis and predict their potential Mie scattering within human age-related nuclear cataracts. Previous studies restricted to the equatorial plane have shown th ...
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Journal ArticleThe Biological bulletin · August 2004
Many deep-sea species, particularly crustaceans, cephalopods, and fish, use photophores to illuminate their ventral surfaces and thus disguise their silhouettes from predators viewing them from below. This strategy has several potential limitations, two of ...
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Journal ArticleIntegrative and comparative biology · August 2003
While transparency, cryptic coloration, and counterillumination are all highly successful cryptic strategies for pelagic species, they become less effective when confronted with varying optical conditions. Transparent species are susceptible to detection b ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology · March 25, 2003
After emerging from underground nests, sea turtle hatchlings migrate through the surf zone and out to the open ocean. During this migration, both waves and water currents can disrupt hatchling orientation by unpredictably rotating the turtles away from the ...
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Journal ArticleLimnology and Oceanography · January 1, 2003
Mirrored and colored surfaces are common adaptations for crypsis in pelagic habitats. Although highly successful when optimized for a particular situation, either may become less successful if it is then viewed in a different situation. In this study we ex ...
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Journal ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences · February 2002
Despite the importance of cryptic and conspicuous coloration in pelagic ecosystems, few researchers have investigated the optimal reflectance spectra for either trait. In this study, the underwater radiance distribution in tropical oceanic water was modell ...
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Journal ArticleThe Biological bulletin · December 2001
Despite the prevalence and importance of transparency in organisms, particularly pelagic species, it is a poorly understood characteristic. This article reviews the current state of knowledge on the distribution, ecology, and physical basis of biological t ...
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Journal ArticleMarine Biology · January 1, 2001
The use of transparency as camouflage in the epipelagic realm is complicated by the presence of ultraviolet radiation, because the presence of UV-protective pigments decreases UV transparency and may reveal transparent zooplankton to predators and prey wit ...
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Journal ArticleTrends in neurosciences · April 2000
Diverse vertebrate animals can sense the earth's magnetic field, but little is known about the physiological mechanisms that underlie this sensory ability. Three major hypotheses of magnetic-field detection have been proposed. Electrosensitive marine fish ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of Plankton Research · January 1, 2000
As the open ocean environment lacks points of refuge from visual predators, it has favored the evolution of extraordinary adaptations for optical concealment, such as vertical migration, transparency and counterillumination. Bioluminescent plankton, which ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom · August 1, 1999
The effect of polarized light on the shade-seeking behaviour of the ophiuroid Ophioderma brevispinum was investigated at the Keys Marine Laboratory, Long Key, Florida, USA. Animals were collected and placed in a partially shaded arena. When the arena was i ...
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Journal ArticleMarine Biology · August 1, 1999
To learn how organisms apportion space in the open ocean, biological oceanographers have sought to improve temporal and spatial resolution of ocean sampling systems. Their objectives are to simultaneously measure physical, chemical and biological structure ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of theoretical biology · July 1999
In the open ocean, many animals are highly transparent, some achieving near invisibility. However, little is known about how this transparency is attained. The effects of cellular ultrastructure on tissue transparency were mathematically modeled. Given a s ...
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Journal ArticleBiological Bulletin · January 1, 1999
The emission of blue-green bioluminescence (λ(max) = 470 nm) was observed from sucker-like structures arranged along the length of the arms of the cirrate octopod Stauroteuthis syrtensis. Individual photophores either glowed dimly and continuously or flash ...
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Journal ArticleBiological Bulletin · January 1, 1998
Transparency measurements (at 400 to 700 nm) were made on living specimens of 29 common species of gelatinous zooplankton from the Northwestern Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico. Percent transparency ranged from 91% for the hydromedusa Sibogota typa to 0.5 ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom · January 1, 1998
Many morphological, chemical, and behavioural characteristics of echinoderms have been implicated as defences against ultraviolet light, though no studies have investigated whether adult echinoderms are damaged by this form of radiation. This study tests w ...
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Journal ArticleThe Biological bulletin · August 1997
Protein extracts of optic cushion tissue from the asteroid Asterias forbesi and arm tissue from the ophiuroid Ophioderma brevispinum were subjected to Western blot analysis. Both tissues contain a membrane-associated protein that reacts with two monoclonal ...
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Journal ArticleThe Journal of experimental biology · October 1994
This study tests the hypotheses that the birefringent calcite and stereom structure of the brittlestar (Ophiuroidea, Echinodermata) endoskeleton polarizes light and that certain brittlestars respond to polarized light. The first hypothesis was tested in Op ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of Zoology · January 1, 1993
The lateral fins of cuttlefish and squid were modelled to test the hypothesis that an array of crossed connective tissue fibres embedded within the musculature of the fins provides the support required for bending and to evaluate the role of the connective ...
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Journal ArticleJournal of theoretical biology · April 1991
We introduce a broadened framework to study aspects of coevolution based on the NK class of statistical models of rugged fitness landscapes. In these models the fitness contribution of each of N genes in a genotype depends epistatically on K other genes. I ...
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