Cephalopods may have evolved complex brains long before our vertebrate relatives.

An octopus brain stores behaviors, not body maps. Detecting food triggers a generalized grab…

@nature

Each of an octopus’s eight arms has enough neural autonomy to function as if it thinks for itself.

@nature

Octopuses have about 500 million neurons, like dogs, but only 10% sit in the central brain.

@nature

An octopus arm bends where opposing muscle waves meet, one traveling from its tip and one from its…

@nature

Octopuses open containers, navigate mazes, change appearance, and mimic animals when unfamiliar…

@nature

Octopus nervous systems are inspiring soft robots controlled through flexible appendages instead…

@nature

Intelligence evolved along radically different paths may reveal how consciousness arises and what…

@nature

Octopuses solve puzzles, demonstrating intelligence comparable to that found in some vertebrates.

@nature