Squid's Brain Contains 500 Million Neurons

A giant squid off the Ogasawara Islands, south of Tokyo CREDIT: KOJI SASAHARA/AP
A giant squid off the Ogasawara Islands, south of Tokyo CREDIT: KOJI SASAHARA/AP
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Squid's Brain Contains 500 Million Neurons

A giant squid off the Ogasawara Islands, south of Tokyo CREDIT: KOJI SASAHARA/AP
A giant squid off the Ogasawara Islands, south of Tokyo CREDIT: KOJI SASAHARA/AP

The intelligence of squids has long caught researchers' interest, especially their color changing skill that allows them to integrate in different backgrounds and communicate with mates.

A research team at the University of Queensland, Australia, has recently uncovered the secret behind this animal's unique potentials.

The researchers have turned to modern technology to complete the first MRI-based map of the brain of the squid. They found that a squid has 500 million neurons. This number is higher than that of rats (200 million) and is more similar to what a dog's brain contains. The results of their study now appear in the journal iScience.

According to the study, the team basically adapted the ideas and techniques from mouse brain research with lots of modifications to make the first high-res squid brain imaging work.

The researchers observed 145 neural connections and pathways, more than 60 percent of which are linked to vision and motor systems. They also found that a lot of neural circuits are dedicated to camouflage and visual communication, giving the squid a unique ability to evade predators and hunt.

It took Senior Author Dr. Wen-Sung Chung and team some four years to come up with the first mesoscale brain map.

"It is like finally we have an early stage Google map, which allows us to navigate the complex brain lobes of these soft bodied creatures with solid knowledge background. This will help target some specific brain lobes or regions to investigate how these apparently smart animals evolve to these abilities," Chung told the Medical News Today website.

"I will focus on their vision-related abilities such as why and how they can do colorblind camouflage, as well as how they can see the polarization signals, which are invisible for most aquatic creatures," he added.

In the future, Chung and colleagues are looking at a comparison of the brain architecture among cephalopods including the solitary octopus, to see if their brains evolved differently according to ecosystem.



Google-Backed Coalition to Help Scale Ocean, Rock Carbon Removals

A Google logo is seen at a company research facility in Mountain View, California, US, May 13, 2025. (Reuters)
A Google logo is seen at a company research facility in Mountain View, California, US, May 13, 2025. (Reuters)
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Google-Backed Coalition to Help Scale Ocean, Rock Carbon Removals

A Google logo is seen at a company research facility in Mountain View, California, US, May 13, 2025. (Reuters)
A Google logo is seen at a company research facility in Mountain View, California, US, May 13, 2025. (Reuters)

A coalition backed by Google, Stripe and Shopify will spend $1.7 million to buy carbon removal credits from three early stage firms on behalf of the tech giants to help scale up the nascent markets, an executive told Reuters.

The world is expected to need to suck between five and 10 billion tons a year of carbon emissions out of the atmosphere by mid-century to reach its climate goals, yet at the moment most technologies are small scale.

The coalition, called Frontier, is also backed by H&M Group, JPMorgan Chase and Salesforce, among others.

The group, which aggregates demand from its members, will spend $1.7 million to buy credits from US-firm Karbonetiq, Italy-based Limenet and Canadian firm pHathom.

By contracting to buy early, the firms are better able to hire, raise finance and get the technologies off the ground, said Hannah Bebbington, head of deployment at Frontier.

"It allows companies to demonstrate commercial viability," she said.

Frontier's support for these early stage firms, which aim to lock emissions away in the ocean or in rocks and industrial waste, marks its fifth series of commitments.

Frontier, which was set up in 2022, aims to invest at least $1 billion in carbon removal credits between 2022 and 2030. It has already committed $600 million, some on the series of pre-purchases and the bulk on a series of off-take agreements with larger firms. Last week, it agreed to pay $41 million for 116,000 tons from waste biomass firm Arbor.

For oceans, the aim is to increase the alkalinity of the water, helping it to lock away more carbon emissions. This is often done by adding "quicklime", made from limestone.

For the mineralization technologies, meanwhile, projects attempt to speed up the process whereby rocks and industrial waste naturally absorb carbon dioxide, for example by crushing up the material to create a larger surface area.

Bebbington said both technologies had the potential to be impactful because they could be scaled quickly and cheaply.

"We think (they) are extremely compelling from that really cheap at really large scale perspective."