--- title: A chameleon changes colour by moving tiny crystals in special skin c… — How animals hide: camouflage and mimicry · tree and pragmatics description: A chameleon changes colour by moving tiny crystals in special skin cells, which changes how light bounces off its skin; it does this mostly to signal to other chameleons and to control its temperature. Who acts: chameleon, special skin cells, light. A sentence of the lesson «How animals hide: camouf --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/51-how-animals-hide/5/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / [How animals hide: camouflage and mimicry](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/51-how-animals-hide/) / 5 # How animals hide: camouflage and mimicry, sentence 5 A chameleon changes colour by moving tiny crystals in special skin cells, which changes how light bounces off its skin; it does this mostly to signal to other chameleons and to control its temperature. **Who acts:** chameleon, special skin cells, light · **What happens:** change, move, bounce off, do, signal, control · **To what, where:** colour, tiny crystals, special skin cells, skin, this, other chameleons This is a sentence of the lesson «How animals hide: camouflage and mimicry» of the biology course of Mova's primary school. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (chameleon, special skin cells, light), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. ## The tree {#tree} ```conllu # sent_id = school:biology:051-how-animals-hide.lesson:5 # text = A chameleon changes colour by moving tiny crystals in special skin cells, which changes how light bounces off its skin; it does this mostly to signal to other chameleons and to control its temperature. # source = school lesson (ours) # course = biology # lesson = 051-how-animals-hide.lesson # annotation = Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R7-rel-agree ×1 1 A a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 2 det _ _ 2 chameleon chameleon NOUN NN Number=Sing 3 nsubj _ _ 3 changes change VERB VBZ Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 0 root _ _ 4 colour colour NOUN NN Number=Sing 3 obj _ _ 5 by by SCONJ IN _ 6 mark _ _ 6 moving move VERB VBG Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part 3 advcl _ _ 7 tiny tiny ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 8 amod _ _ 8 crystals crystal NOUN NNS Number=Plur 6 obj _ _ 9 in in ADP IN _ 12 case _ _ 10 special special ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 12 amod _ _ 11 skin skin NOUN NN Number=Sing 12 compound _ _ 12 cells cell NOUN NNS Number=Plur 6 obl _ _ 13 , , PUNCT , _ 15 punct _ _ 14 which which PRON WDT PronType=Rel 15 nsubj _ _ 15 changes change VERB VBZ Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 12 acl:relcl _ _ 16 how how ADV WRB PronType=Int 18 advmod _ _ 17 light light NOUN NN Number=Sing 18 nsubj _ _ 18 bounces bounce VERB VBZ Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 15 ccomp _ _ 19 off off ADP IN _ 21 case _ _ 20 its its PRON PRP$ Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs 21 nmod:poss _ _ 21 skin skin NOUN NN Number=Sing 18 obl _ _ 22 ; ; PUNCT , _ 24 punct _ _ 23 it it PRON PRP Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 24 nsubj _ _ 24 does do VERB VBZ Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 3 parataxis _ Agree=R7-rel-agree|Haiku=3:conj 25 this this PRON DT Number=Sing|PronType=Dem 24 obj _ _ 26 mostly mostly ADV RB _ 28 advmod _ _ 27 to to PART TO _ 28 mark _ _ 28 signal signal VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 24 advcl _ _ 29 to to ADP IN _ 31 case _ _ 30 other other ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 31 amod _ _ 31 chameleons chameleon NOUN NNS Number=Plur 28 obl _ _ 32 and and CCONJ CC _ 34 cc _ _ 33 to to PART TO _ 34 mark _ _ 34 control control VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 28 conj _ _ 35 its its PRON PRP$ Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs 36 nmod:poss _ _ 36 temperature temperature NOUN NN Number=Sing 34 obj _ _ 37 . . PUNCT . _ 3 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} No stored speech act for this sentence. | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **change** | present | a chameleon | colour | | | | | vn dress-41.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent colour=Patient | | 2 | **move** | gerund | a chameleon *not said here* | tiny crystals | | special skin cells | | | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent crystal=Theme | | 3 | **change** | present | special skin cells | | | | | | tree rules | | 4 | **bounce off** | present | light | chameleon's skin | | | | | vn run-51.3.2-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent skin=Agent | | 5 | **do** | present | chameleon | this | | | | | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent this=Eventuality | | 6 | **signal** *speech: other* | to-infinitive | chameleon *not said here* | | other chameleons | | | mostly *property* | vn instr\_communication-37.4.1 «NP V PP.recipient that S»: agent=Agent to chameleon=Recipient | | 7 | **control** | to-infinitive | chameleon *not said here* | chameleon's temperature | | | | | vn enforce-63 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent temperature=Theme | One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree. **Licence: [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)**, as the whole of Mova corpus 0.4, of which this treebank (the agreed school, `mova-school-agreed-en.conllu`) is part. The lessons were written for Mova's primary school. Sentence `school:biology:051-how-animals-hide.lesson:5`. **The tree:** Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R7-rel-agree ×1. **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the lesson read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence. See the [release 0.4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/releases/0.4/). - ← previous: [How animals hide: camouflage and mimicry, 4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/51-how-animals-hide/4/) - next →: [How animals hide: camouflage and mimicry, 6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/51-how-animals-hide/6/) - ↑ back to [the lesson](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/51-how-animals-hide/)