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Wily Octopi Walk on Two Arms

Posted by Zonk on Sat Mar 26, 2005 01:33 AM
from the coming-for-you dept.
Robotics Science
lousyd writes "Offering hope for new forms of ambulatory robots, biologist Christine L. Huffard, at UC Berkeley, has caught individual octopi sneaking away from predators by using two of their arms as legs. They use the other six arms to make themselves look like coconuts or algae. The research is being done as part of a project on robotics. This reminds me of the Far Side cartoon where the cows drop to all fours when humans come around, but resume standing on two legs otherwise." And I for one welcome our new mollusk overlords.
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  • Octopus! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by BWJones (18351) * on Saturday March 26 2005, @01:34AM (#12052653) Homepage Journal
    And I for one welcome our new mollusk overlords.

    Octopus are spooky smart. They are pretty good problem solvers, they have excellent vision and a bizarre sense of curiosity. They will explore just about everything they can access, and have distinct personalities. They are in all likelihood the smartest organisms in the sea second to cetaceans. I wrote [slashdot.org] in a previous discussion on Slashdot about my pet octopus, Cephus (short for cephalopod), but that was only one instance of amazing behaviors I had witnessed. I have also dived off the Pacific Northwest with giant pacific red octopus (Octopus dofleini) and found them to be quite curious and for the most part docile (this is in contrast to squid which are truly ruthless aliens that would kill you if given the slightest chance) unless you piss em off and which point they usually simply want to get away. However, I have seen them steal items from divers and swim off with them as well.

    The interesting thing about robotics and control of complex systems like this is the computational control required of such structures. Octopus can almost seemingly turn themselves to liquid and fit through the most amazingly small spaces, yet their strength would amaze (and I suspect scare) you. Even my pet octopus (Octopus bimaculoides) who was about a foot long could generate incredible forces from very muscular arms. The giant octopus would be so strong, they could likely (literally) tear you apart if they were not so docile. Here is the deal though: They need an aqueous environment to move effectively. I suspect that for robotics teams, some combination of hydrostatic muscles and exoskeletons would be necessary, which now that I am thinking about it could be huge for artificial limbs for amputees. Right now the most advanced artificial limbs have internally driven servos that have limits on torque that are quite low. This technology could open the door for more capable artificial limbs and exoskeletons to enhance human movement as well as robotics.

    Oh, other links of interest to the original Science paper are here [sciencemag.org], but you need a subscription to see the full text article. The movies linked there though are free.

    • OK, I was going to mention coming across something about an octopus moving across a table from one tank to another. I thought it was a discovery channel flashback or something. I guess I read your previous post and it stuck in the dim recesses of my mind.

      I do remember seeing a show featuring a two chambered octopus tank with a spiral tube about 5cm across linking the upper chamber of the tank to the lower. Despite the fact that the tube was much smaller than the octopus, the animal was able to move bet
      • Despite the fact that the tube was much smaller than the octopus, the animal was able to move between the chambers at will.

        Feed it a diet of Cheetos and TV, and THEN see it fit thru.

    • Re:Octopus! (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Alien54 (180860) on Saturday March 26 2005, @02:05AM (#12052766) Journal
      For more info, check out The Octopus News Magazine Online [tonmo.com]

      And of course, there is this on the dangers of squid: Scary Squid Stories [bajadestinations.com]:

      Although they look flaccidly impotent when laid out dead on the deck, when alive in the water, Humboldt squid are powerful, vicious, meat-eating predators, and they are very dangerous to swim near. Around Baja, more gruesome stories are told about people getting killed by squid than by any other sea creature. Imagine a swarm of 50-pound animals capable of swimming more than 20 miles-per-hour, equipped with voracious appetites and over 1,000 suckers, each containing about 20 gripping teeth strong enough to tear human skin (correct, that's 20,000 teeth!). And, surrounded by that cluster of four-foot long arms is a powerful parrot's beak the size of a small tangerine, snapping and cutting at anything pulled within its reach.

      In Baja, the typical "diablo" squid story involves a hapless fisherman who is suddenly caught and pulled overboard while night fishing commercially with lights. Within a couple of seconds, his entire body is literally covered with clinging, biting squid that quickly pull him down into the dark and tear him to pieces before anybody can help.

      Yes it is important to remember that they are NOT the same creature

        • Your graphic description of octopi pulling fishermen overboard has stirred up the battle between species that rages within me.

          Those are the Humboldt Squid, not an Octopus. Like I said above

          Octopus are much more mild mannered

    • Re:Octopus! (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 26 2005, @02:06AM (#12052768)
      "spooky" smart, eh?

      It may be spooky for people who are brought up to believe humans are somehow different to all other life.

      But unless you think that our vast capacity for problem solving and creativity, abstract thought, achievements like mathematics, quantum mechanics and relativity, our level of understanding ranging from the atom to the birth of the universe, etc. is also "spooky", then I don't see why you are in such apparent awe (fear?) of this creature's "smarts".

    • I object to the anti-squidism! (Score:5, Interesting)

      by gkitty (869215) on Saturday March 26 2005, @02:35AM (#12052850)
      this is in contrast to squid which are truly ruthless aliens that would kill you if given the slightest chance

      I've never been aware of being close to large squid and couldn't begin to guess their mindset, but I've swum amongst thousands of modest sized squid who have exhibited no hostility whatsoever.

      In all seriousness, I've found squid to be some of the coolest creatures I've ever seen, and they can be very hard to see. They usually make themselves appear to be just like water, which is probably useful for animals that most things would find to be tender and yummy. So if you're looking for squid, you don't quite look for anything tangible, mostly you look for an odd change in the refraction of the water, and then you see if the refraction has eyes.

      If you can do this, and it is admittedly an odd skill, keep looking, and you may find that the eyes are studying you very intentedly (and I always assumed without malice!) Often once you see one you will realize that you are surrounded by hundreds of them, and once they realize you see them and don't seem to be a threat, they sort of 'uncloak'. Their skin is the coolest thing you have ever seen, it almost has a television like effect, as it pulses and flows with many colors, very fast and trippy.

      They have the oddest motion, they approach you tentacles first, but they flee tentacles back, and as they watch you, they pulse back and forth in curiosity (maybe that is malice!) and fear, with their colors and patterns pulsing in time. I have always felt that they are communicating with a visual language, though obviously that language lacks phrases like "Stay away from the boat with the bright lights!"

      I agree with you that octopuses are super cool, I sometimes look for them when I snorkel, and again looking for an octopus is like looking for something that isn't quite not there. They have great camoflage, so mostly you look where they ought to be in a crack or something, and you usually figure out they're there before you quite see them. They have the coolest ambulation and jet powered swimming too.

      I've read that octopuses are mostly built of liquid tissue. Can't pretend to understand exactly how that works, but I've seen a large octopus flow through a pinhole, it's the weirdest thing.

      • Re:I object to the anti-squidism! (Score:5, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 26 2005, @03:33AM (#12052979)
        Squid can kill anyone they want! Squid cut off heads ALL the time and don't even think twice about it. These creatures are so crazy and awesome that they flip out ALL the time. I heard that there was this squid who was swiming along. And when some dude dropped a spoon the squid killed him. My friend Mark said that he saw a squid totally uppercut some kid just because the kid opened a window.

        And that's what I call REAL Ultimate Power!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    • Here is the deal though: They need an aqueous environment to move effectively. I suspect that for robotics teams, some combination of hydrostatic muscles and exoskeletons would be necessary, which now that I am thinking about it could be huge for artificial limbs for amputees. [snip] This technology could open the door for more capable artificial limbs and exoskeletons to enhance human movement as well as robotics.

      I have no expertise in this area, so this might just be a lot of babble, but what sort of a

      • Re:Octopus! (Score:4, Interesting)

        by BWJones (18351) * on Saturday March 26 2005, @10:44AM (#12054180) Homepage Journal
        but what sort of applications might this have with "prosthetic" eyes? It seems (to my uneducated mind) that you could have lenses that change shape and adapt to changing conditions much more rapidly. Perhaps an octopus muscle system girdling the eyeball instead of corrective lenses?

        You might be closer to reality than you think. It turns out that aqueous lenses are a hot area of research. Principally, cell phone manufacturers are looking at this technology, but the applications to artificial lenses for humans are significant. For instance, when one gets their lens replaced with an artificial one due to cataracts or trauma, you lose the ability to accommodate the lens. An implantable, focusable lens would be a huge leap and it is just this sort of unconventional thinking that is going to move us forward.

    • Natural muscle tissue doesn't use torque to generate torque.

      So why are we still using torque to generate torque in robots?

      Massively parallel, flexible linear actuators, either attached to a hinged, rigid structure, or using its own internal pressure to provide rigidity, seems to be the key.
      • That's because using torque to generate torque is easy to calculate.

        If it's easy to calculate, it's easy to model. if it's easy to model then its less risky to build, and you know why it doesn't work when it doesn't work.

        Of course there are a few undergrad mechatronics engineers at my university that want to do what you say. Let them see the math. If they crack the math, then I'll sign up to pay them for my first hardsuit.

  • I saw this on the news. (Score:5, Funny)

    by FireballX301 (766274) on Saturday March 26 2005, @01:36AM (#12052655) Journal
    Mind you, a large clump of reddish flesh walking along a sandy seabed with greenish water as a background is not what I would call camoflauged.
    • The point is not to blend in with their surrondings, but to like something uninteresting to whatever they are trying to hide from. A predator that would feast on an octopus would not like pay attention to a piece of seaweed floating by or a coconut bouncing along the sea floor. Speaking of which, if I hadn't read the article, I would not have guessed that those were octopi.

    • Re:I saw this on the news. (Score:5, Informative)

      by BWJones (18351) * on Saturday March 26 2005, @01:50AM (#12052713) Homepage Journal
      Mind you, a large clump of reddish flesh walking along a sandy seabed with greenish water as a background is not what I would call camoflauged.

      Ah, but you need to understand the properties of color in sea water. There is considerable color filtering of light as it passes down through the column of water rendering red objects as dark olive or dark colored objects. Blue light penetrates very well as do certain wavelengths of green (why the Navy is so keen on blue and blue/green lasers). Most of the pictures you see of organisms in the ocean are with artificial light rendering them as they would appear to our eyes on the surface.

      One other point: Our eyes are fairly poor at discriminating colors compared with most fish. We only have three color channels with which to process color, whereas many fish have four, five, six or more channels to see a much richer world than we could ever appreciate.

    • I saw within the last year, though, a show about the so-called "mimic" octopus, which I think this is an example of. It's kind of small, but it quite literally mimics other creatures rather well, both in coloring and behavior.

      A rather remarkable little creature.

      Also amazing about octopi is that the coloring cells on their bodies are, IIRC, directly mapped into neurons in their brains. No ganglia, etc., to combine signals in.

  • /. needs a bio section. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 26 2005, @01:39AM (#12052667)
    Those video clips are the cutest things I've seen.

    /., please add a bio category - a lot of interesting stuff happens in this category.

  • How perfect... (Score:5, Funny)

    by PedanticSpellingTrol (746300) on Saturday March 26 2005, @01:42AM (#12052682)
    What better way to ring in the opening of the Hardware section than with... invertebrate biology? Wait, WTF?

  • Octopus is a Greek word (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    So the plural should be octopodes.

    (In the same way, platypodes is the plural of platypus)
    • So everyone is speaking Greek when they talk about an octopus? I don't think so. Greeks don't say octopus when they want to talk about eight-armed cephalopods with no tentacles and no shell.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octopus#Plural [wikipedia.org]
    • The word 'octopus' is derived from the Greek oktopous - okto, "eight," and pous, "foot." The Greek plural of pous is podes. Since it is best to use a Greek plural for a Greek root that means the most proper plural for octopus IS octopodes like you said. However, practically no one uses this term, not even the scientists who study the animals.

      The word octopi is still the least correct of our options. That usage mistakes the "us" on the end of octopus as a Latin suffix, and applies a Latin plural to it. Yo

    • We're not speaking Greek (Score:4, Informative)

      by Xtifr (1323) on Saturday March 26 2005, @03:44AM (#12053004) Homepage
      English is not Greek, and, like it or not, "octopuses" and "octopi" are both listed in dictionaries of the English language, but "octopodes" are not.

      Octopi here [m-w.com], but no octopodes [m-w.com].

      Or to put it another way, I'm sympathetic to your argument, but I still disagree with you. :)

      • Re:We're not speaking Greek (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Okay, now you're just being a smartass. If you look in a good dictionary, like the Oxford English Dictionary, you see octopodes. Octopi is incorrect, but common, and dictionaries are usually descriptive. Being common doesn't mean it's correct, and here it isn't. End of story.

        The original article used "octopuses," which is fine, but then the submitted changed it to "octopi" to make himself look erudite. That is what pisses people like me off - it's not that the Greek is being forgotten, it's that pompous ass

    • Automobile, feh! (Score:5, Funny)

      by douglips (513461) on Saturday March 26 2005, @04:11AM (#12053042) Homepage Journal
      I laugh at your claim of the existence of an "automobile". Surely anyone inventing such a device would be educated enough to know that it should be called either an "ipsomobile" or an "autokineticon."

  • Allow me to be the first to say... (Score:5, Funny)

    by uhlume (597871) on Saturday March 26 2005, @02:00AM (#12052746) Homepage
    Cthulhu fhtagn, Cthulhu fhtagn! Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!
  • When I saw the headline I automatically thought of a certain octopus boss from a Megaman game.

  • Damn Dirty Octopi (Score:5, Funny)

    by tinrobot (314936) on Saturday March 26 2005, @02:09AM (#12052779)
    Just make sure they don't get their tentacles on any firearms.

  • Slashdot is SLOOOOOOW (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jsimon12 (207119) <slashdotNO@SPAMxemu.org> on Saturday March 26 2005, @02:12AM (#12052788) Homepage
    Long gone are the days when Slashdot has stories before mainstream media. I head this on NPR, oh well Slashdot, so much for being edgy.
    • Not to pick on you in particular (oh I'm sure you're shaking in your boots, bah) but with so many people making this same comment I have to address at least one of them. While it is all well and good to have that hear it here first edge it would be crippling to not post something simply because it lacks that one attribute. Yes everybody has already heard at least something about this but it does not mean that it shouldn't be posted. It's interesting damnit, that should be the first and main concern in cho
  • NPR did a story on this today. You can get audio of the story as well as video of the octopi walking at:

    http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?story Id=4561136
  • In related news, the babylonians have attacked the greeks, and the roman empire's power is waning.
  • welcome our new cephalopod overlords
  • And I've had a very long day at "work," too.

    So I take it we've all heard the story about the guy who filmed his pet octopus climbing out of its saltwater tank, crawling 12 feet across the floor and up a stand into a freshwater tank to eat the goldfish before heading back?

  • Hardware section? (Score:5, Funny)

    by mtrisk (770081) on Saturday March 26 2005, @02:41AM (#12052861) Journal
    hardware.slashdot.org? Where's the slashdot announcement? And why are octopi in the hardware section? Do they run linux or something?

  • Coconuts? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Skiron (735617) on Saturday March 26 2005, @03:06AM (#12052921) Homepage
    I didn't know coconuts 'sneaked' away from predators away? What do they do, roll away innocently whistling?

  • Yahoo! News story has a streaming video clip... (Score:3, Informative)

    by antdude (79039) on Saturday March 26 2005, @06:55AM (#12053519) Homepage Journal
    Click here [yahoo.com] for the story and streaming video clip.

  • Geckos, Otopus, and Robots (Score:3, Informative)

    by AndOne (815855) on Saturday March 26 2005, @08:58AM (#12053804)
    I actually saw a talk by one of the people involved in the work being done at Berkeley on this very subject Thursday. His names Robert J. Full and he's with the Biology dept at Berkeley. His and his students work have inspired an entire host of materials engineering and robotics applications. For instance his work with geckos has lead to work being done on producing nanoscale nonsticky adhesives which are based on van der Waal forces. Also based on his studies of the cockroach(and again his students) we're seeing some robots which are capable of climbing up walls and transversing really really rough terrain. Definitely someone to keep track of if you're interested in biological inspiration for engineering.

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