For the first time ever, marine biologists have measured how much energy octopuses really need to change color — and it's a ...

The findings are the first to quantify how much work goes into switching on chromatophores, the specialized color-changing ...

A pair of biologists at Walla Walla University, in the U.S., have developed a way to calculate the energy costs for certain ...

“Though octopuses make color change look effortless, it isn’t for them.” An octopus arm. The small dots visible on the arm are the chromatophores. Credit: Jamie Andersen Fields. Even this ...

It’s not easy being green–or blue, or purple, or orange–at least not if you’re an octopus. Cephalopods are well-known for their incredible ability to camouflage and communicate via their rapidly color ...

Octopuses are masters of camouflage and disguise. An alarmed octopus can vanish even while you watch, flawlessly transforming ...

When the octopus first emerged, it was a pale, almost translucent color. (Image credit ... usually not exceeding a year-it's possible that changing oceanic factors influenced their abundance.

One is color. Octopuses generate color through ... By contracting special muscles, octopuses can change their skin from smooth to spiky. The effect can be extreme. The algae octopus, Abdopus ...

The metabolic cost of changing color could be quite high indeed – and it could be more beneficial for octopuses to hide when they can, and use camouflage only when no other options are available.

Octopuses’ most impressive survival tactic is their skin: They can change the color and texture of their skin to blend in with their surroundings and avoid detection. Can you spot the octopus in ...