Optometry Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Optometry, including details on myopia, optometric practice, therapy.

Spatial resolution for feature binding is impaired in peripheral and amblyopic vision.

Neri P, Levi DM

School of Optometry and Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-2020, USA. pn@white.stanford.edu

We measured spatial resolution for discriminating targets that differed from nearby distractors in either color or orientation or their conjunction. In the fovea of normal human observers, whenever both attributes are big enough to be individually visible, their conjunction is also visible. In the periphery, the two attributes may be visible, but their conjunction may be invisible. We found a similar impairment in resolving conjunctions for the fovea of deprived eyes of humans with abnormal visual development (amblyopia). These results are quantitatively explained by a model of primary visual cortex (V1) in which orientation and color maps are imperfectly co-registered topographically. Our results in persons with amblyopia indicate that the ability of the fovea to compensate for this poor co-registration is consolidated by visual experience during postnatal development.

Published 14 June 2006 in J Neurophysiol, 96(1): 142-53.
Full-text of this article is available online (may require subscription).

© 2005-2008 Optometry Research Today. All Rights Reserved.