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marcandre
Very interesting. I don't understand why it mentions this to be a brand new discovery, since the presence of opsins in the skin of animals for mimetism has been known for some time, e.g. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/octopuses... (2015)
djmips
It seems that the article you reference is more speculating but the article posted is much further along with some results.
rob74
...plus it covers a whole different type of animal (cephalopod vs. fish)
dekhn
I believe there is some more recent work on this, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4448664/ """LACE (light-activated chromophore expansion) in isolated preparations suggests that octopus skin is intrinsically light sensitive and that this dispersed light sense might contribute to their unique and novel patterning abilities. Finally, our data suggest that a common molecular mechanism for light detection in eyes may have been co-opted for light sensing in octopus skin and then used for LACE."""

another, more recent paper, which is more of a review: https://www.cell.com/current-biology/pdf/S0960-9822(22)00659...

wolverine876
The discovery in the OP is of dermal photoreception in a vertabrate.
bolangi
Article says it's the first case of opsins found in the skin of a vertebrate.
mywacaday
Why have land animals never evolved adaptive camouflage?
trimethylpurine
Just taking a guess, but maybe translucent skin doesn't do as well for survival in the sun.
taskforcegemini
aren't fish with that feature also technically "under the sun" (dependent on visibility gained by the sun)?
trimethylpurine
Check out the Beer-Lambert law. Intensity declines exponentially with depth.
DistractionRect
I would think Chameleons count has having active camouflage, no?
mywacaday
Good point, forgot about them. How about anything warm blooded?
xwdv
What is there to really see when you’re dead? If you were dead, would you want to see anything?
stronglikedan
My guess is that it's like the eyes surviving to detect light after the parts of the brain that can interpret the light hitting the rods and cones has died.
tempodox
It depends, do they have Netflix in the afterlife?
tough
I really hope not, that sounds like a really bad limbo to be stuck into
seanhunter
Forced for all eternity watching just vids of YouTube influencers telling you their daily routine and making tier lists of stuff.
xwdv
Worse, scrolling endlessly forever looking for something to watch.
gumby
Nails and hair continue to grow after the heart and brain stop, though obviously not perpetually.
mrweiner
That’s a misconception - hair and nails don’t continue growing after death. Retraction of the skin makes it appear as though they do. https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20130526-do-your-nails-gr...
gumby
Thanks! After typing that comment I began to wonder how that would work, but figured "hey if it's true, and I've heard it plenty of times, there must be something interesting going on".
telecuda
While I usually withhold personal comments here, I love this article because the Hogfish is the only main species here in Florida that for whatever reason I can't catch (while all my mates have). They even bought me a Hogfish cutting board to remind me each day of my "white whale." I'm so glad to read of their camouflage abilities to use that as an excuse!
stronglikedan
Hopefully they've at least shared some with you, because it's delicious.