Biology Department, Duke University, Box 90338, Durham, NC 27708, USA.
Proc Biol Sci. 2012 Jun 22;279(1737):2386-90. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2012.0026. Epub 2012 Feb 15.
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.
乌贼为了适应给定背景而迅速改变外观以进行伪装，这使我们能够了解它们的视觉感知。最近的研究表明，孤立的边缘信息足以引起与整个物体存在时非常相似的身体图案。在这里，我们通过测试对由碎片组成的“物体”的人工背景的身体图案反应来检查乌贼的轮廓完成情况，这些碎片可以绕其轴旋转，并且碎片散布在背景上，同时还包括阳性（完整的圆）和阴性（均匀背景）对照。动物对完整的和碎片的圆显示出相似的反应，但对旋转的和散布的碎片则使用了不同的身体图案。这表明它们完成了破碎的圆圈，并将其识别为完整的物体，而旋转和散布的碎片则被解释为独立的小物体。我们在实现底栖浅水环境中的精确伪装的背景下讨论了我们的发现。
