These cephalopodsuse three types of cells in their skin for their camouflage displays: chromatophores, iridophores, and leucophores.
The chromatophores are small neuronally controlled "pigment sacs" that cover the body. When expanded by 15-25 radial muscles, each chromatophore displays either brown, red, or yellow coloration depending on the type of pigment it contains. When thousands of these chromatophores are expanded, they form the visual body pattern. Because these are directly innervated by the brain, they can be expanded or contracted in milliseconds, resulting in a rapidly adaptive body pattern change.
The iridophores are plate-like cells stacked beneath the chromatophores that reflect iridecent light by their diffraction of ambient light. Beneath the iridophores, the leucophores are cells which reflect the ambient light (typically a whitish color under natual sunlight).
These cell types together allowthese animals to maintain such effective camouflage in their environment.
