Nemo And Other Reef Fish Can See Colors We Can’t

If Disney’s Nemo, Marlin and Dory were real, they would probably be able to see color regions in greater detail than we can.

AsianScientist (Sep. 28, 2016) – Researchers in Australia have shown that reef fish can see colors that humans cannot. Their work was published in Royal Society Open Science.

A team from Professor Justin Marshall’s Sensory Neurobiology Lab at the Queensland Brain Institute, University of Queensland, ran a series of behavioral experiments with trigger fish in a bid to decode how they see the world. Marshall said that previous studies had looked into the color vision of goldfish, but this study was unique in that it explores how reef fish discern colors.

The research team led a series of detailed behavioral tests where trigger fish were rewarded for discriminating against progressively similar colors. It emerged that trigger fish see colors in some color regions in more detail than humans.

“Coral reefs are the most colorful environments in the world, and it’s now become clear that reef fish see colors we can’t. Some reef fish, such as the anemone fish ‘Nemo’ and other damselfish, can see the UV wavelengths we protect ourselves from. Triggerfish, on the other hand, see more or less the same color range we do, but their color discriminations are different,” said Marshall.

He added that because the reef fishes live in a blue ocean, their color tasks are blue-biased. As the colors of the reef change and disappear because of climate change, Marshall noted that ironically, we are just now beginning to understand how reef inhabitants see and experience their vibrant world.

This comparative color vision research has several potential applications, such as in cancer detection, satellite design and data storage on computers, the researchers said.


The article can be found at: Champ et al. (2016) Color Thresholds in a Coral Reef Fish.

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Source: University of Queensland; Photo: Pixabay.
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