ArticleScientific reports2018
The adaptive value of camouflage and colour change in a polymorphic prawn.
Article in Scientific reports, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 37 citations in OpenAlex.
- Predator responses to prey camouflage strategies: a meta-analysis.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2022Pooled it
- Altitude and ground brightness explain interpopulation variation in dorsal coloration in a lizard.Current zoology · 2025Article
- Intrapopulation variability in coloration is associated with reproductive season in the crayfishCurrent zoology · 2025Article
- Influence of Substrate Color on Oyster Shell Colonization.microPublication biology · 2025Article
- Habitat geometry rather than visual acuity limits the visibility of a ground-nesting bird's clutch to terrestrial predators.Ecology and evolution · 2023Article
- Camouflage in lichen moths: Field predation experiments and avian vision modelling demonstrate the importance of wing pattern elements and background for survival.The Journal of animal ecology · 2022Article
- Effects of pairing on color change and central gene expression in lined seahorses.Genes, brain, and behavior · 2022Article
- Phylogeography, colouration, and cryptic speciation across the Indo-Pacific in the sea urchin genus Echinothrix.Scientific reports · 2021Article
- Evolutionary fine-tuning of background-matching camouflage among geographical populations in the sandy beach tiger beetle.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2020Article
- Experimental evidence that matching habitat choice drives local adaptation in a wild population.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2020Article
- Colour change and behavioural choice facilitate chameleon prawn camouflage against different seaweed backgrounds.Communications biology · 2019Article
- Varying benefits of generalist and specialist camouflage in two versus four background environments.Behavioral ecology : official journal of the International Society for Behavioral EcologyArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Camouflage has been a textbook example of natural selection and adaptation since the time of the earliest evolutionists. However, aside from correlational evidence and studies using artificial dummy prey, experiments directly showing that better camouflaged prey to predator vision are at reduced risk of attack are lacking. Here, we show that the level of camouflage achieved through colour adjustments towards the appearance of seaweed habitats is adaptive in reducing predation pressure in the prawn Hippolyte obliquimanus. Digital image analysis and visual modelling of a fish predator (seahorse) predicted that brown prawns would be imperfectly concealed against both brown and red seaweed respectively, whereas pink prawns should be well camouflaged only in red weed. Predation trials with captive seahorses (Hippocampus reidi), coupled with high-speed video analyses, closely matched model predictions: predation rates were similar for brown prawns between seaweed types, but pink individuals were attacked significantly less on red than brown weed. Our work provides some of the clearest direct evidence to date that colour polymorphism and colour change provides a clear adaptive advantage for camouflage, and also highlights how this can be asymmetric across morphs and habitats (i.e. dependent on the specific background-morph combination).
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.