Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

Visual System

Visual System

Light enters the eye through the cornea, a transparent, dome-shaped surface covering the surface of the eyeball that helps to direct and focus incoming light. This light is then channeled toward the pupil, an adjustable opening whose size is controlled by the iris. The iris, a pigmented muscle, regulates the amount of light entering the eye by contracting or dilating the pupil, thereby ensuring optimal light levels for clear vision.
Once through the pupil, the light passes through the lens, a...

Vision

Vision

Vision is the result of light being detected and transduced into neural signals by the retina of the eye. This information is then further analyzed and interpreted by the brain. First, light enters the front of the eye and is focused by the cornea and lens onto the retina—a thin sheet of neural tissue lining the back of the eye. Because of refraction through the convex lens of the eye, images are projected onto the retina upside-down and reversed.

Color Vision

Color Vision

Color perception begins in the retina, the light-sensitive layer at the back of the eye. Two main theories explain how colors are seen: the trichromatic theory and the opponent-process theory. The trichromatic theory, proposed by Thomas Young in 1802 and extended by Hermann von Helmholtz in 1852, suggests that color vision is based on three types of cone receptors in the retina. These cones are sensitive to different but overlapping ranges of wavelengths corresponding to red, blue, and green.

Parallel Processing

Parallel Processing

The brain processes sensory information rapidly due to parallel processing, which involves sending data across multiple neural pathways at the same time. This method allows the brain to manage various sensory qualities, such as shapes, colors, movements, and locations, all concurrently. For instance, when observing a forest landscape, the brain simultaneously processes the movement of leaves, the shapes of trees, the depth between them, and the various shades of green. This enables a quick and...

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

Realistic monkey body animation reveals an uncanny valley in macaque body perception.

PLoS biology·2026

Same author

From body selectivity to socio-emotional meaning: where extrastriate body area stops.

Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991)·2026

Same author

The extrastriate body area: beyond visual analysis of body parts?

Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991)·2026

Same author

Low-dimensional and optimised representations of high-level information in the expert brain.

Nature communications·2026

Same author

Tracing aesthetic experience from perception and conception to appraisal using deep convolutional neural networks.

iScience·2026

Same author

Can Category-selective Cortex Predict Categorization Behavior?

Journal of cognitive neuroscience·2026

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: Mar 6, 2026

Visualizing Visual Adaptation

Visualizing Visual Adaptation

Published on: April 24, 2017

Recent Visual Experience Shapes Visual Processing in Rats through Stimulus-Specific Adaptation and Response

Kasper Vinken¹, Rufin Vogels², Hans Op de Beeck³

¹Laboratory of Biological Psychology, KU Leuven, Tiensestraat 102, 3000 Leuven, Belgium; Laboratory for Neuro- and Psychophysiology, KU Leuven, O&N 2 Herestraat 49, Box 1021, 3000 Leuven, Belgium.

Current Biology : CB

|March 7, 2017

Summary

Rodent vision aids navigation and predator evasion by detecting visual changes. This study found that neural responses in higher visual areas of rats, unlike primary areas, show enhanced activity for unexpected stimuli, indicating a system specialized for detecting surprising events.

Keywords:

adaptation change detection mismatch negativity oddball predictive coding rat repetition suppression response enhancement surprise response visual cortex

More Related Videos

Automated Visual Cognitive Tasks for Recording Neural Activity Using a Floor Projection Maze

Automated Visual Cognitive Tasks for Recording Neural Activity Using a Floor Projection Maze

Published on: February 20, 2014

Behavioral Assessment of Visual Function via Optomotor Response and Cognitive Function via Y-Maze in Diabetic Rats

Behavioral Assessment of Visual Function via Optomotor Response and Cognitive Function via Y-Maze in Diabetic Rats

Published on: October 23, 2020

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: Mar 6, 2026

Visualizing Visual Adaptation

Visualizing Visual Adaptation

Published on: April 24, 2017

Automated Visual Cognitive Tasks for Recording Neural Activity Using a Floor Projection Maze

Automated Visual Cognitive Tasks for Recording Neural Activity Using a Floor Projection Maze

Published on: February 20, 2014

Behavioral Assessment of Visual Function via Optomotor Response and Cognitive Function via Y-Maze in Diabetic Rats

Behavioral Assessment of Visual Function via Optomotor Response and Cognitive Function via Y-Maze in Diabetic Rats

Published on: October 23, 2020

Area of Science:

Neuroscience
Visual System Research
Animal Behavior

Background:

Ecological theories suggest rodent vision primarily serves navigation and predator evasion.
Fast visual change detection is crucial for survival, yet mechanisms supporting this in rodents are not fully understood.
The oddball paradigm and predictive coding theories offer frameworks for studying neural responses to expected vs. unexpected stimuli.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate neural mechanisms for visual change detection in the rat visual system.
To determine if rodent visual cortex exhibits response enhancement for unexpected stimuli, as predicted by predictive coding theories.
To compare neural responses in primary visual cortex (V1) and a higher visual area (LI).

Main Methods:

Multi-unit spiking activity was recorded in rat primary visual cortex (V1) and latero-intermediate area (LI) during a visual oddball experiment.
The oddball paradigm involved presenting rare, unexpected visual stimuli within a train of repeated stimuli.
Analysis focused on neural response patterns, specifically stimulus-specific adaptation and response enhancement.

Main Results:

Rat V1 showed response suppression (stimulus-specific adaptation) but not response enhancement to unexpected stimuli.
Area LI exhibited clear surprise-based response enhancement in addition to stimulus-specific adaptation.
These findings indicate a hierarchical processing of visual information in the rodent ventral visual stream.

Conclusions:

Neural responses in higher visual areas of the rat ventral stream are sensitive to unexpected visual events.
The rodent visual system, particularly higher areas like LI, appears specialized for detecting changes and surprising stimuli.
This specialization likely supports crucial functions such as predator evasion and environmental monitoring.