Thanks to Brilliant for supporting this episode of SciShow. Go to Brilliant.org/SciShow to
learn more about their course on Knowledge and Uncertainty.
[ ♪INTRO ]
A couple years ago, some people floated around the idea that octopuses came from another
planet.
They don’t, but there is something almost otherworldly about them.
And that’s probably because they have tons of strange and amazing adaptations that help
them live their best lives underwater.
In fact, much like aliens in a scifi movie, there’s a lot they can teach us. So: Here
are eight incredible things we’re learning from studying octopuses!
You might have noticed that the undersides of octopuses’ arms are covered in hundreds
of little circular things that look — and act — like suction cups.
They’re super sticky and attach to most surfaces: rough or smooth, and wet or dry.
And once they’re stuck, they can stay that way for a long time without the octopus doing,
well, much of anything, really.
And not only are they energy-efficient, they’re also incredibly strong.
A sucker the size of a pencil eraser can lift about 150 grams — or, approximately a baseball’s
weight.
And each of the roughly six-centimeter suckers of a giant Pacific octopus can lift up to
16 kilograms. And they have thousands of them.
That’s a lot of staying power. Which is why engineers have taken a close look at octopus
suckers to uncover their sticky secrets.
Turns out, the sides and edges have tiny grooves in them, which increases the surface area
for sticking and helps them adhere to rough surfaces.
They’re also made of super soft tissue, kind of like a jellyfish, which makes them
more elastic.
And that elasticity allows them to bulge and compress to form a tight seal with different
surfaces.
Researchers are already using octopus suckers as the inspiration for new adhesives and suction
cups that work better than what we have now.
Like, ones that can be removed and re-stuck without losing stickiness and that can adhere
to rough surfaces.
That would allow us to make all sorts of useful things, from adhesive electronics that monitor
medical information to graspier robot arms.
Now, octopus suckers can stick to pretty much everything — and yet, you never see an octopus
stuck to itself.
This is especially surprising since research has shown that an octopus’s arms aren’t
represented in its central brain at all.
Each one is controlling itself and moving completely independently.
And in part, that’s because there are molecules in the skin that inhibit the suckers’ reflexive
grabbiness.
But they can choose to have one arm grab another. So, even though the central brain doesn’t
fully control the arms, it can override this “don’t grab” molecular signal.
Scientists call this kind of partial centralized command embodied organization.
Basically, it’s when a controller — in this case the brain — a body, and the environment
all influence each other.
And engineers would love to use a similar strategy in autonomous robots, because it
makes performing a variety of complex tasks more efficient.
Instead of programming the robot’s central computer with instructions for what each robot
body part should do in every situation, the brain, body, and external sensors would learn
from the information coming from the other systems.
Think about an arm swinging as a robot moves at different speeds.
If you had to program exactly how each joint should move to make it swing the perfect amount
at all times, you’d have to input a ton of information into the central computer.
But if you’re able to rely on the natural physics of the shape of the arm, and it can
provide feedback to the brain as it moves, you don’t need nearly as much initial programming.
So this type of embodied organization can make information processing a lot more streamlined
and efficient — and that means, if robots can “think” more like octopuses, they
could do even more cool stuff.
Our arms only have a few joints, each with a limited range of motion.
But octopus arms can move in virtually any direction at any point along the arm, including
lengthening, shortening, or stiffening.
This means they can use their arms for, well, everything — from squeezing through the
tightest spaces to opening clamshells for food.
And that’s why octopus arms are providing inspiration for a new generation of robotics.
These robots are soft and flexible, but also able to exert large amounts of force.
Some designs use a series of compartments that can be individually filled with air to
mimic octopuses’ movements.
Another uses cables to recreate the muscle structure that lets octopuses move the way
they do.
Either way, researchers are interested in using these soft-bodied robots to do things
robots with human-like appendages couldn’t even dream of.
Like, complete diverse tasks underwater, but also perform surgery more precisely, and,
in their tiniest form, detect and capture individual pathogens in the body.
Of course, no conversation about octopuses could be complete without talking about their
skin.
Octopus skin can display all sorts of colors and patterns, and even create weird textures
to help them blend in with their environment — something we often want our structures,
vehicles, and personnel to do better.
The colors and patterns of octopus skin are thanks to something called chromatophores.
These are organs connected to muscles that can expand or contract when the animal is
excited, revealing or hiding the pigments inside.
And octopuses can manipulate these to match to colors it sees around it — either with
its eyes, or potentially, with light-sensitive receptors in its skin.
On top of this, when an octopus contracts certain muscles, sections of skin called papillae
pressurize and stretch, causing bumps to appear.
So their skin can provide a ton of inspiration when it comes to better camouflage.
For instance, some researchers have developed a fabric that has light-sensitive sensors
embedded in it.
When the light changes, the fabric automatically changes between light and dark patterns.
Other researchers are creating programmable camouflaging membranes that use air to go
from a flat, two-dimensional surface to a 3D texture — much like papillae.
And hopefully, that will allow whatever it covers to blend into the background.
Even though octopuses usually move by walking along the seafloor, they can swim.
They draw water into a central body cavity and then quickly push it out through a small
opening in short bursts, propelling themselves forward.
This method uses a lot of energy, but it’s a really fast and effective way to avoid predators.
And moving this way could be a lot faster than conventional propulsion designs like
propellers — which is why researchers are basing new underwater propulsion systems on
these cephalopods.
One such robot was able to travel up to ten times its body length per second.
Plus, since there aren’t external blades, boats with octopus-like propulsion could be
less damaging to undersea habitats and animals.
Researchers in Germany have even 3D printed one of these, and in addition to moving fast
and being less dangerous to marine life, it’s completely silent.
Which would be nice for those on board as well as below the waves, since marine animals
are often scared by boat noises.
Between predators, mating, and sometimes actually eating themselves, octopuses get injured a
lot.
But that’s okay — they’re also masters of regeneration!
After being injured, an octopus folds skin over the wound to protect it while it heals.
Special cells then remove dead and decaying tissue, keeping the wound nice and clean.
And if that wound is an entire arm, they don’t just heal the end of the stump.
Octopuses can regrow a complete functioning arm — with nerves, muscles, tissue, and
all— in about 90 days.
They can also regrow parts of their hearts — because, they have three, you know — and
in some rare cases, their corneas. And... maybe even parts of their brain?!
All of which we would love to be able to do for ourselves. It’s literally the entire
point of the field of regenerative medicine.
Which is why lots of researchers are studying octopus healing in extreme detail.
They want to know everything — the types of cells involved, what they do, how everything
gets reorganized, you name it — because all of it can teach us more about how to regrow
damaged human tissue.
And octopuses are especially great for this research because they regenerate so many different
types of organs and cells!
We haven’t used any intel from octopuses to actually regrow our body parts yet. But
just give those researchers a little more time!
Despite their ability to regenerate, octopuses do eventually die…. usually after reproducing.
After a female octopus lays tens to hundreds of thousands of eggs, she settles in for the
long haul.
She’ll protect them until they hatch, never leaving them unattended — not even to grab
a snack.
For most octopuses, mommy duty lasts a few weeks to a few months. But in one extraordinary
case, a mother octopus watched over her brood for 53 months.
That’s four and a half years without eating or doing anything else! That’s dedication.
And it almost makes me feel better about the fact that, afterwards, she rested… forever.
Now, this extreme motherhood is interesting and all, but it might not seem super relevant
to us.
But the key thing to realize is that, after all this, the female doesn’t die because
she starves.
Rather, it’s because she ages. And when her duties are complete, hormonal signals
tell her cells that it’s time to let go completely.
It turns out that the drive to ignore everything except parental duties and the wave of programmed
cell death are both controlled by a gland behind her eyes called the optic gland.
If this gland is removed, the mama octopus will abandon her nest, go in search of food,
gain weight, and sometimes even mate again.
And she’ll live significantly longer than octopuses who wait around for their eggs to
hatch.
But what’s especially interesting is that this gland is the octopus equivalent of our
pituitary gland.
That means studying it could help us better understand what our pituitary gland does and,
in particular, its role in aging.
And a deeper, molecular level understanding of how and why these mamas die the way they
do could, just maybe, provide clues for keeping people or their tissues alive longer.
That’s not the only life-extending trick octopuses may have hiding up their eight sleeves.
They may also be a great source for pharmaceuticals!
And that’s because — get this! — all octopuses are venomous.
Research suggests that they gained their toxic abilities at least 300 million years ago,
before they split from their cephalopods cousins like cuttlefish.
These venoms can help keep predators away from their soft, unprotected bodies. But mostly,
they’re useful for hunting.
They can drill into their prey’s shell and inject a paralytic venom. Then, with the meal
immobilized, they can liberate the tasty meat from its protective casing.
And these venoms can pack more of a punch than you might think! For instance, the tiny,
blue-ringed octopus can actually kill a human with a single bite.
But, they might also help us live longer.
Venoms in general are super useful for developing new drugs.
That’s because the toxins in them often have very specific targets, which means they
can be used to do really specific things to our bodies.
That’s what you want in a pharmaceutical — since, you know, side effects aren’t
awesome.
Drug developers have tapped venoms for drugs that modulate the immune system, keep blood
from clotting, shrink tumors, and kill microbes.
But because scientists only recently learned that all octopuses are venomous, we’ve only
begun to examine their potential.
Really, that’s true of most aspects of octopus biology — there’s still a lot we don’t
know about them.
So while we’re already learning a ton from these octo-armed creatures, plenty of opportunities
remain to discover bizarre and surprising features.
And when we do, we’ll probably be able to borrow from them to develop new technologies
and learn about ourselves.
But if you don’t want to wait to keep on learning, you might be interested in a course
from Brilliant.
Like, their course on Knowledge and Uncertainty. Because there’s a lot of uncertainty out
there right now. This course is designed to give you the tools to understand what we don’t
know, and deal with the flood of information we’re exposed to day in and day out.
Brilliant has a ton of interactive, engaging courses designed to help you sharpen your
skills in science, engineering, computer science, and math .
And they’re designed by career educators and lifelong learners, so they know how to
help you learn.
Right now, the first 200 people to sign up at Brilliant.org/SciShow will get 20% off
an annual Premium subscription to Brilliant. And by checking them out, you’re helping
to support SciShow too — so thanks.
[ ♪OUTRO ]