Abstract

As the short-wave-sensitive (SWS) cones comprise a small percentage of the total cone population, it has been suggested that they only function to provide an additional dimension to color space. However, we have recently shown that the SWS cones do contribute to a variety of spatial information processing tasks. In these studies SWS cone responses were isolated by superimposing blue test stimuli on an intense yellow adapting field. Masking studies under these conditions show that the SWS cones contribute to two or three spatial mechanisms that are tuned to low spatial frequencies and are orientation selective. The SWS cones were next shown to be capable of both spatial frequency discrimination and vernier acuity, although thresholds were higher than for the luminance system in both cases. Other studies have shown that the SWS cones also contribute to both stereopsis and motion processing. All of these results suggest that the SWS cones contribute to all forms of spatial information processing as effectively as possible given their sparse sampling distribution in the retina.

© 1990 Optical Society of America