Biology subjects

Cuthill, I. C.

Publications and source records attributed to Cuthill, I. C..

7 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2025

Shining a light on camouflage evolution: using genetic algorithms to determine the effects of geometry and lighting on optimal camouflage

Visual camouflage evolves within the bounds of lights interaction with the surroundings and the sensory limits of its observers. Rapid temporal variation in lighting from weather and its interaction with objects within the visual scene alters the contrast of the spatio-chromatic features of both backgrounds and animals, the latter through self-shading and received shadows from their surroundings. Despite the apparent effect of lighting on object appearance, the enormity of interactions and the diversity of animal phenotypic solutions present challenges to investigating the combined effects of lighting and habitat structure on camouflage effectiveness and design. Genetic algorithms and mathematical animal pattern generation provide a potential solution to investigating this high-dimensional feature space. Here, an online artificial evolution experiment was used to examine the effect of lighting and habitat geometry on camouflage. Lighting and geometry changed which prey phenotypes evolved, and the predictive power of common camouflage metrics. Crucially, lighting condition systematically altered prey-targets internal contrast and interacted with habitat geometry, affecting the evolved patterning, colour, and countershading. Our work demonstrates the importance of considering the relative geometry and lighting of an environment when determining the function of animal colouration and the adaptive value of camouflage.

ecology↗

bioRxiv2025

The effects of habitat structure and lighting on object and background appearance

The color, geometry, and lighting of environments characterize their appearance to humans and other animals and, as a result, play an important role in the evolution of animal coloration. Yet despite this long-standing association, how changes in lighting from atmospheric conditions and three-dimensional geometry interact to alter the appearance of scenes and animals remains largely unexplored. To investigate these interactions, we quantified the appearance of natural backgrounds and standardized targets with color-calibrated photographs and 3-dimensional (3D) scans of 672 natural scenes taken under diffuse and direct lighting conditions. We find several instances where lighting and the local 3D environment systematically altered the colors and patterns of scenes and a target object, as well as their relationship with spatial scale. Shadows formed under direct lighting increased luminance and short-long wave (blue-yellow) contrast across spatial scales, especially at larger spatial scales for habitats with a greater 3D variation. Conversely, medium-long wave (green-red) information was highly stable to changes in lighting. Direct lighting and the 3D environment also influenced the directionality and orientation of patterns within the scenes and targets due to the formation of cast and self-shadows of different orientations. These analyses demonstrate the importance of considering the lighting and geometry of an environment when comparing the statistics of animals and their backgrounds.

ecology↗

bioRxiv2023

From natural to sexual selection: Revealing a hidden preference for camouflage patterns

Background-matching visual patterns are selected to minimize detection by predators. However, once detected, what effects do these patterns have on conspecific perception? In humans, considerable evidence supports a "processing bias" by which people prefer images that match the spatial statistics of natural scenes, likely because the brain has evolved, or develops, to process such scenes efficiently. A direct but untested prediction of this bias is that people should prefer background-matching patterns compared to similar patterns that mismatch the spatial statistics of their surroundings. We conducted an online experiment to test this prediction on over 1700 participants. Our results show that a preference for the most frequent value of Fourier slope (a measure of spatial structure) observed in natural scenes can be modulated by an additional preference for background-matching. Because the initial stages of perception that underlie the efficient processing of visual scenes are widely conserved among animals, especially vertebrates, we expect this preference for background-matching patterns to be shared by other organisms. Two overlooked potential implications are that some animals may choose display sites with spatial statistics matching their own phenotype, and that the evolution of visual signals will, variously, be constrained or facilitated by such preferences for background-matching patterns. Highlights- Processing bias aims to explain the origins of preference for sexual signals - It predicts visual properties of background-matching patterns make them attractive - An online experiment with over 1700 human participants confirms that prediction - Results have important implications for the preference and design of animal signals

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2022

Warning coloration, body size and the evolution of gregarious behavior in butterfly larvae

Many species gain anti-predator benefits by combining gregarious behavior with warning coloration, yet there is debate over which trait evolves first, and which is the secondary adaptive enhancement. Body size can also influence how predators receive aposematic signals, and potentially constrain the evolution of gregarious behavior. To our knowledge, the causative links between the evolution of gregariousness, aposematism and larger body sizes have not been fully resolved. Here, using the most recently resolved butterfly phylogeny and an extensive new dataset of larval traits, we reveal the evolutionary interactions between important traits linked to larval gregariousness. We show that larval gregariousness has arisen many times across the butterflies, and aposematism is a likely prerequisite for gregariousness to evolve. We also find that body size may be an important factor for determining the coloration of solitary, but not gregarious larvae. Additionally, by exposing artificial larvae to wild avian predation, we show that undefended, cryptic larvae are heavily predated when aggregated but benefit from solitariness, whereas the reverse is true for aposematic prey. Our data reinforce the importance of aposematism for gregarious larval survival, whilst identifying new questions about the roles of body size and toxicity in the evolution of grouping behavior.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2019

The ARRIVE guidelines 2019: updated guidelines for reporting animal research

Reproducible science requires transparent reporting. The ARRIVE guidelines were originally developed in 2010 to improve the reporting of animal research. They consist of a checklist of information to include in publications describing in vivo experiments to enable others to scrutinise the work adequately, evaluate its methodological rigour, and reproduce the methods and results. Despite considerable levels of endorsement by funders and journals over the years, adherence to the guidelines has been inconsistent, and the anticipated improvements in the quality of reporting in animal research publications have not been achieved.\n\nHere we introduce ARRIVE 2019. The guidelines have been updated and information reorganised to facilitate their use in practice. We used a Delphi exercise to prioritise the items and split the guidelines into two sets, the ARRIVE Essential 10, which constitute the minimum requirement, and the Recommended Set, which describes the research context. This division facilitates improved reporting of animal research by supporting a stepwise approach to implementation. This helps journal editors and reviewers to verify that the most important items are being reported in manuscripts. We have also developed the accompanying Explanation and Elaboration document that serves 1) to explain the rationale behind each item in the guidelines, 2) to clarify key concepts and 3) to provide illustrative examples. We aim through these changes to help ensure that researchers, reviewers and journal editors are better equipped to improve the rigour and transparency of the scientific process and thus reproducibility.

scientific communication and education↗

bioRxiv2019

Reporting animal research: Explanation and Elaboration for the ARRIVE guidelines 2019

Improving the reproducibility of biomedical research is a major challenge. Transparent and accurate reporting are vital to this process; it allows readers to assess the reliability of the findings, and repeat or build upon the work of other researchers. The NC3Rs developed the ARRIVE guidelines in 2010 to help authors and journals identify the minimum information necessary to report in publications describing in vivo experiments.\n\nDespite widespread endorsement by the scientific community, the impact of the ARRIVE guidelines on the transparency of reporting in animal research publications has been limited. We have revised the ARRIVE guidelines to update them and facilitate their use in practice. The revised guidelines are published alongside this paper. This Explanation and Elaboration document was developed as part of the revision. It provides further information about each of the 21 items in ARRIVE 2019, including the rationale and supporting evidence for their inclusion in the guidelines, elaboration of details to report, and examples of good reporting from the published literature.

scientific communication and education↗

bioRxiv2018

Evolving optimum camouflage with Generative Adversarial Networks

We describe a novel method to exploit Generative Adversarial Networks to simulate an evolutionary arms race between the camouflage of a synthetic prey and its predator. Patterns evolved using our methods are shown to provide progressively more effective concealment and outperform two recognised camouflage techniques. The method will be invaluable, particularly for biologists, for rapidly developing and testing optimal camouflage or signalling patterns in multiple environments.

animal behavior and cognition↗