Neuronal mechanisms underlying differences in spatial resolution between darks and lights in human vision

Pons, Carmen; Mazade, Reece; Jin, Jianzhong; Dul, Mitchell W.; Zaidi, Qasim; Alonso, José‐Manuel

doi:10.1167/17.14.5

Cited by 20 publications

(93 citation statements)

References 77 publications

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“…The larger and longer the stimulus target, the more pronounced the ON cortical dominance. Therefore, taken together with previous studies, our results suggest that exposing the retina to low spatial frequency patterns (e.g., optical blur and/or low light) makes visual cortical responses more OFF dominated (Pons et al, 2017), whereas exposing the retina to large homogeneous bright surfaces (e.g., sky patches) makes visual cortical responses more ON dominated.…”

Section: Changing On/off Response Balance Toward On Dominancesupporting

confidence: 84%

“…In particular, bright large slow targets (e.g., sky patches) seen while blinking should boost ON visual responses, a prediction that supports old beliefs that blinking protects against myopia (Bates, 1920). In turn, low light and optical blur should weaken ON responses (Pons et al, 2017) and explain why reading at low light increases myopia. Future research is needed to investigate possible new approaches to selectively stimulate the ON pathway to treat visual disease.…”

Section: Possible Implications Of the On And Off Functional Specializmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In cats, scotopic light levels can switch some cortical responses from OFF to ON dominated (Ramoa et al, 1985). However, in humans, darks remain more salient than lights under low mesopic light (Pons et al, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Functional Specialization of ON and OFF Cortical Pathways for Global-Slow and Local-Fast Vision

et al. 2019

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Graphical AbstractHighlights d Small fast stimuli drive stronger OFF than ON cortical responses.d Large long-lasting stimuli suppress more OFF than ON cortical responses.d ON/OFF spatiotemporal asymmetries are preserved across a wide luminance range.d ON and OFF cortical pathways are specialized in global-slow and local-fast vision. SUMMARYVisual information is processed in the cortex by ON and OFF pathways that respond to light and dark stimuli. Responses to darks are stronger, faster, and driven by a larger number of cortical neurons than responses to lights. Here, we demonstrate that these light-dark cortical asymmetries reflect a functional specialization of ON and OFF pathways for different stimulus properties. We show that large long-lasting stimuli drive stronger cortical responses when they are light, whereas small fast stimuli drive stronger cortical responses when they are dark. Moreover, we show that these light-dark asymmetries are preserved under a wide variety of luminance conditions that range from photopic to low mesopic light. Our results suggest that ON and OFF pathways extract different spatiotemporal information from visual scenes, making OFF local-fast signals better suited to maximize visual acuity and ON globalslow signals better suited to guide the eye movements needed for retinal image stabilization.

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Section: Changing On/off Response Balance Toward On Dominancesupporting

confidence: 84%

Section: Possible Implications Of the On And Off Functional Specializmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Functional Specialization of ON and OFF Cortical Pathways for Global-Slow and Local-Fast Vision

et al. 2019

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“…The response magnitude was scaled by R max (Eq. 1) and the spike threshold ( th ) was simulated as a power function.The R max , L 50 , and n were lower for ON than OFF pathways ( R max : 80, L 50 : 0.4, n : 1.4 for ON; R max : 100, L 50 : 0.5, n : 2.3 for OFF) to make the saturation of the luminance-response function more pronounced for ON than OFF pathways, consistently with previous measurements in cats, monkeys, and humans 15,23 . The spike threshold values for each speed were arbitrarily chosen with the only requirement being that they had to increase with stimulus velocity (5 deg s −1 : 1.0, 10 deg s −1 : 2.0, 16.15 deg s −1 : 2.5, 30 deg s −1 : 3.0, 60 deg s −1 : 3.5).…”

Section: Methodssupporting

confidence: 90%

Motion changes response balance between ON and OFF visual pathways

et al. 2018

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Humans are faster at detecting dark than light stationary stimuli, a temporal difference that originates early in the visual pathway. Here we show that this difference reverses when stimuli move, making detection faster for moving lights than darks. Human subjects judged the direction of moving edges and bars, and made faster and more accurate responses for light than for dark stimuli. This light/dark asymmetry is greatest at low speeds and disappears at high speeds. In parallel experiments, we recorded responses in the cat visual cortex for moving bars and again find that responses are faster for light bars than for dark bars moving at low speeds. We show that differences in the luminance-response function between ON and OFF pathways can reproduce these findings, and may explain why ON pathways are used for slow-motion image stabilization in many species.

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“…The asymmetry itself as found in healthy subjects corroborates previously shown ON-OFF asymmetry as found for multiple visual performances (Komban et al J Vis 2013;13:ARVO E-Abstract 1022). [31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38] The fact that differences between glaucoma and healthy subjects do not clearly depend on the exact stimulus parameters (as depicted by the vertical shift of the curves in Figure 3 and the absence of clear significant interactions between glaucoma and luminance in Table 2) seems to disagree with patient experience. In a recent questionnaire study, 1 we found that glaucoma patients reported disproportionately more complaints under extreme (low, high, and changing) luminance conditions compared to controls.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Retinal Contrast Gain Control and Temporal Modulation Sensitivity Across the Visual Field in Glaucoma at Photopic and Mesopic Light Conditions

João

Scanferla

Jansonius

2019

Invest. Ophthalmol. Vis. Sci.

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Citation: João CAR, Scanferla L, Jansonius NM. Retinal contrast gain control and temporal modulation sensitivity across the visual field in glaucoma at photopic and mesopic light conditions. Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci. 2019;60:4270-4276. https://doi.org/ 10.1167/iovs.19-27123 PURPOSE. Glaucoma affects many aspects of visual performance, including adaptation, and this may depend on ambient luminance. We determine the influence of glaucoma and luminance on temporal aspects of adaptation, specifically on contrast gain control and temporal modulation sensitivity (TMS).METHODS. This case-control study included 12 glaucoma patients and 25 age-similar controls (50-70 years). Threshold perimetry was performed with a minimized testing grid (fovea and four peripheral locations). Stimuli (Goldmann size III 50 ms increment/decrement) were presented on a time-varying background with sinusoidally-modulated luminance (amplitude 60%; frequency 0-30 Hz; mean background luminance, 1 and 100 cd/m 2 ). TMS (2.5-30 Hz) was measured in the same locations with a sinusoidally-modulated stimulus (Goldmann size IV, 334 ms) on a steady background (1 and 100 cd/m 2 ). RESULTS.In healthy subjects, contrast sensitivity decreased with increasing background modulation frequency and increased again at very high frequencies, indicating contrast gain control. Minimum sensitivity was located between 2.5 and 20 Hz, depending on luminance and eccentricity. In glaucoma patients, the same frequency dependency was found (P ¼ 0.12) but with an overall reduced sensitivity (P ¼ 1 3 10 À5 ), independent of luminance (P ¼ 0.20). Decrements differentiated better between glaucoma and healthy subjects than increments (P ¼ 0.004). TMS was reduced in glaucoma (P ¼ 5 3 10 À6 ) across all frequencies and luminance levels, with complete loss for high frequencies at 1 cd/m 2 .CONCLUSIONS. Contrast gain control is largely unaffected in glaucoma, suggesting intact amacrine cell function. Perimetry with decrements or a high-frequency stimulus on a lowluminance background seems best to differentiate between glaucoma and healthy subjects.

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Neuronal mechanisms underlying differences in spatial resolution between darks and lights in human vision

Cited by 20 publications

References 77 publications

Functional Specialization of ON and OFF Cortical Pathways for Global-Slow and Local-Fast Vision

Functional Specialization of ON and OFF Cortical Pathways for Global-Slow and Local-Fast Vision

Motion changes response balance between ON and OFF visual pathways

Retinal Contrast Gain Control and Temporal Modulation Sensitivity Across the Visual Field in Glaucoma at Photopic and Mesopic Light Conditions

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