{
  "id": 19404293,
  "title": "Octopuses Can Squeeze Through Tiny Gaps — and Scientists Now Know How They Do It",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/11/10/octopuses-can-squeeze-through-tiny-gaps-and-scientists-now-know-how",
  "topic": "science",
  "section": "Science",
  "published": "2026-11-10T22:15:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Discover Magazine",
    "slug": "discover-magazine",
    "url": "https://www.discovermagazine.com/octopuses-can-squeeze-through-tiny-gaps-and-scientists-now-know-how-they-do-it-49925"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Octopuses are known for their extraordinary abilities, such as changing color, manipulating tools, and recognizing human faces. They can also squeeze through incredibly small openings, defying the laws of physics. Researchers from the National University of Singapore have now uncovered how they manage to do this.\n\nThe study, published in Experimental Biology, involved placing three common octopuses (Octopus vulgaris) and four Mayan octopuses (Octopus maya) in Perspex boxes with holes tailored to each octopus. The hole size was based on the distance between the octopuses' eyes, which the researchers believed could help identify the smallest hole the octopus can squeeze through.\n\nThe results were surprising. While larger holes allowed the octopuses to use a four-step strategy, involving their arms, head, and mantle, smaller holes required a different approach. In these cases, the octopus would push the remaining arms, head, and mantle through the gap before extending the head and mantle. Interestingly, the common octopus managed both hole sizes successfully, while the Mayan octopuses struggled with the smaller ones.\n\nThe researchers suggested that the octopuses' adaptability to different hole sizes could have implications for the development of soft-bodied robots. These robots, inspired by the octopus, could provide an alternative to conventional search-and-rescue or exploration robots with slender snake-like bodies. However, the researchers noted that more refinement is needed to fully understand the octopuses' arm-use preferences.",
  "summary": "Discover the tactics octopuses use to slip through holes smaller than their heads.",
  "key_points": [
    "Octopuses can squeeze through tiny gaps, defying physics",
    "Researchers from NUS study octopus squeezing abilities",
    "Common octopus adapts to different hole sizes, Mayan struggles"
  ],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 2,
    "also_reported_by": [
      {
        "outlet": "Smithsonian",
        "title": "Octopuses Are the Ultimate Escape Artists. Now Scientists Know How the Creatures Contort Themselves to Squeeze Through Tiny Holes",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/11/10/octopuses-are-the-ultimate-escape-artists-now-scientists-know-how-the",
        "published": "2026-11-10T21:17:11.000Z"
      }
    ]
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}