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Although the visual evoked potential (VEP) for isoluminant stimuli has been characterized in terms of spatiochromatic parameters, temporal tuning along various chromatic directions has received less systematic attention. Additionally, there has been little categorical comparison of psychophysical appearance with VEP responses obtained for temporal variation of these patterns. At appropriate contrasts the VEP's for color axes (LM, S) show a robust and contrast-sensitive temporal tuning peak at 4 Hz. Contrast response functions at 4 Hz for the LM color axis are markedly nonmonotonic. However, there is a clear monotonicity with contrast for VEP latencies along these color axes. The anomalous behavior does not appear to be due to interactions between chromatic signals, to luminance artifact, or to rod intrusion. These anomalies in the temporal characteristics of the chromatic VEP may reflect interactions between chromatic responses and inherent cortical responsivity not linked to psychophysical behavior.

Purpose: To determine whether specific chromatic pathways are selectively affected by short-term variations in blood glucose levels in observers with and without diabetes., Methods: Ten subjects with diabetes, all with type 1 diabetes and no retinopathy, and eight age-similar normal subjects were tested. Cortical visually evoked potentials (VEPs) in response to stimuli designed to selectively activate the short-wavelength-sensitive (S) or long- and middle-wavelength-sensitive (LM) chromatic (isoluminant) pathways or the achromatic pathway were recorded over a period of several hours. Capillary blood glucose also was measured repeatedly over the same period. The relation between VEP latency and blood glucose was determined., Results: The S-pathway VEP latency was correlated significantly with blood glucose in a slight majority (6/10) of persons with diabetes; S-pathway latency was longer at higher blood glucose levels. This association between S-pathway latency and blood glucose was not dependent on the pattern of blood glucose variation over time (i.e., significant correlations between blood glucose and latency were observed in persons for whom blood glucose increased, decreased, or rose and then fell over time). No dependence on blood glucose was observed for LM- or achromatic-pathway VEP latency in subjects with diabetes., Conclusions: Acute variations in blood glucose of subjects with diabetes over hours selectively affect the function of the short-wavelength-sensitive chromatic pathway. The findings are discussed within the context of known mechanisms by which elevated glucose affects cellular metabolism with a time course consistent with the transient nature of the effect observed.

The contribution of chromatic mechanisms to motion processing is currently debated. Although OKN as a measure of motion processing has been employed for chromatic stimuli, the contribution of chromatic mechanisms to the production of OKN has not been assessed directly. We measured voluntary-pursuit and involuntary-stare OKN responses to drifting patterns defined by colors modulated in a cone based color space which isolates luminance and color mechanisms. Results show that OKN responses are reduced for isoluminant stimuli, particularly for the stare conditions. The greatest reduction in responses occur for isoluminance stimuli that isolate the S cones. These results suggest that the chromatic mechanisms may have reduced input to the neural substrate that produces involuntary-stare OKN or that stare OKN has different temporal characteristics when stimulated by chromatic and luminance mechanisms. We also measured OKN asymmetries in several convergent strabismics in response to isoluminant and luminance patterns and compared their response to previous reports of horizontal OKN asymmetries in normal neonate infants. The results question the validity of either the modeling of OKN asymmetries in strabismus as incomplete development or the comparison of adult eye movement records evaluated with criteria for OKN with psychophysical forced choice evaluation of ocular drift in infants.

Visual evoked potentials (VEPs) were measured for sinusoidal gratings with spatio-chromatic modulation defined in a three-dimensional color space. The spatio-chromatic modulation of the gratings can be decomposed into contributions from an achromatic luminance varying component, an isoluminant component which modulates only the activities of L cones and M cones, and an isoluminant component corresponding to modulation of only S-cone activity. The emphasis of this report is the nature of VEPs resulting from isoluminant spatio-chromatic modulation. The VEP response was characterized along a number of spatial, temporal, and chromatic stimulus dimensions: contrast, spatial frequency, chromaticity in the isoluminant plane, chrominance/luminance ratio, orientation, and temporal frequency. Isoluminant VEPs resulting from stimuli modulating L and M cones are compared with those from S-cone modulation. When appropriate spatiotemporal conditions are employed, both types produce robust VEPs; however, the S-pathway VEPs show considerably longer latencies than do those from LM-pathway activation. The VEP results are compared to psychophysical and single unit electrophysiological observations. VEP latencies exhibit the lowpass character of psychophysical chromatic contrast sensitivity functions but VEP amplitudes show bandpass tuning along both the S and LM axes. An oblique effect, i.e. shorter latencies for horizontal and vertical gratings than for diagonal, is observed in the isoluminant VEP. S-pathway VEPs are used to demonstrate an electophysiological correlate of transient tritanopia. Normative amplitude and latency data for VEPs from selectivity stimulated chromatic mechanisms provide a baseline for clinical electrodiagnostic applications.

The owl monkey (Aotus trivirgatus) is the only nocturnal monkey. The photopigments of Aotus and the relationship between these photopigments and visual discrimination were examined through (1) an analysis of the flicker photometric electroretinogram (ERG), (2) psychophysical tests of visual sensitivity and color vision, and (3) a search for the presence of the photopigment gene necessary for the production of a short-wavelength sensitive (SWS) photopigment. Both electrophysiological and behavioral measurements indicate that in addition to a rod photopigment the retina of this primate contains only one other photopigment type--a cone pigment having a spectral peak ca 543 nm. Earlier results that suggested these monkeys can make crude color discriminations are interpreted as probably resulting from the joint exploitation of signals from rods and cones. Although Aotus has no functional SWS photopigment, hybridization analysis shows that Aotus has a pigment gene that is highly homologous to the human SWS photopigment gene.

Visual evoked potentials were recorded in response to spatiochromatic stimuli modulated in different directions in cone-activation color space from subjects with congenital and acquired color defects. This technique was effective for detection and classification of both mild and severe forms of congenital deficits. Results suggest that the visual evoked potential is useful for early identification of color abnormalities in acquired deficits such as diabetes and that it is sensitive enough to detect regional retinal losses of sensitivity (e.g., as in central serous choroidopathy). The spatiochromatic visual evoked potential provides a systematic and sensitive indication of different color-vision anomalies.

Electroretinogram (ERG) flicker photometry was used to examine the photopigment complements of representatives of four genera of Canid: domestic dog (Canis familiaris), Island gray fox (Urocyon littoralis), red fox (Vulpes vulpes), and Arctic fox (Alopex lagopus). These four genera share a common cone pigment complement; each has one cone pigment with peak sensitivity of about 555 nm and a second cone pigment with peak at 430-435 nm. These pigment measurements accord well with the conclusions of an earlier investigation of color vision in the dog, and this fact allows some predictions about color vision in the wild canids. An additional set of measurements place the peak of the dog rod pigment at about 508 nm.

Behavioral and electrophysiological methods were used to measure sensitivity to flickering lights in a dichromatic species, the California ground squirrel (Spermophilus beecheyi). Discrimination tests were used to determine spectral sensitivity at stimulus frequencies from 5-50 Hz and increment threshold spectral sensitivity. The contributions of retinal mechanisms to these capacities were assessed by recording the responses of optic nerve fibers to temporally modulated monochromatic lights. In the ground squirrel, as in the human, the shape of the spectral-sensitivity function depends on the temporal frequency of the stimulus. Results from single-unit recording show that all of the classes of optic nerve fibers in the ground squirrel are highly phase-locked to the stimulus for modulation rates as high as 50 Hz. Neither the responses of photoreceptors nor any class of optic nerve fiber can singly account for the behavioral results. The electrophysiological results are also counter to models which propose that temporally dependent changes in the spectral sensitivity of spectrally opponent fibers account for the behavior. The temporal resolution of the optic nerve fibers exceeds that of the behaving animal suggesting that retinal mechanisms do not limit behavioral temporal resolution.

A circadian rhythm of DNA synthesis is present in most organs of adult mammals, with peak levels (acrophase) generally in the rest period. We have recently reported that in the rat brain the acrophase of the rhythm of thymidine incorporation into DNA occurs on the contrary during the active period. To determine whether the brain waking activity was exerting a modulatory action we measured the circadian rhythm of incorporation in the brain and kidney of young adult male rats housed in conditions of sensory and social enrichment or impoverishment for four days. Biochemical and autoradiographic data show that the brain rhythm persists in the enriched condition, but is abolished in the impoverished condition. On the other hand, the rhythm of incorporation in the kidney is maintained in both conditions. These results suggest that the permanence of the brain oscillation is selectively dependent on the complexity of the sensory and social stimulation.

To investigate whether scotopic sensitivity is set locally or in neural "pools", we have tested the spatial variation in sensitivity after bleaching with gratings using 3 different methods. One experiment circumvented the influence of involuntary eye movements by deliberately randomizing the horizontal position of a fine test line on the area bleached by the vertical gratings. The spatial variation of threshold across the bleached area is reflected in the width of the frequency-of-seeing curve. A clear difference between the probability-of-seeing curves following a grating bleach and a uniform bleach was seen only up to between 4.2 and 6.3 c/deg, suggesting that adaptation signals are pooled so as to almost obliterate the contrast in finer gratings than this. In a second experiment the lowest bleaching-grating contrast (for a space-averaged initial rhodopsin bleach of 10%) that produced a patterned afterimage stayed close to the scotopic threshold contrast for frequencies from 1 to 6.4 c/deg, but it rose above the contrast threshold at high spatial frequencies. This slight loss of sensitivity at the high frequencies is more evidence for pooling in adaptation. A third experiment assessed the sensitivity profile at the adapting site without any influence of later stages of neural integration. Bleaching and test gratings of slightly different spatial frequency were flashed successively. If the effect of bleaching is restricted to the bleached rods, the observer will effectively be looking at the test grating through a grid of sensitive and insensitive stripes in his own retina. The two gratings come in and out of register at the difference frequency, and a corresponding low-frequency grating should be visible even when the test and bleaching gratings are not themselves resolved by the later stages. We could not see the difference frequency unless the test and bleach gratings were themselves coarse enough to be resolvable in rod vision. This is very strong evidence against any model in which each rod has its own sensitivity-regulating mechanism, and instead supports (for these conditions) Rushton's view that adaptation is entirely the work of a neural pool. The estimated pool size is about 10 min arc of visual angle.

Temporal properties of the short-wavelength cone mechanism of the California ground squirrel (Spermophilus beecheyi), a dichromat, were explored with single light pulses and pulse trains. Both the electroretinogram (ERG) and the isolated PIII component of the retinal gross response were recorded under chromatic adaptation conditions that favored the detection of test lights by either the middle-wavelength mechanism or the short-wavelength mechanism. The ERG b-wave generated by the short-wavelength mechanism was significantly slower than that of the middle-wavelength mechanism, but there was no such difference in the PIII components of the two mechanisms. Analysis of PIII revealed that both cone types respond equally well to flicker at rates at least as high as 46 Hz. Differences in the temporal response properties of these two cone mechanisms must arise largely from post-receptoral interactions.

The color vision of five saddle-backed tamarins (Saguinus fuscicollis) was studied. Behavioral tests of color discrimination and spectral sensitivity indicate that this species has a color vision polymorphism. Individual monkeys have either dichromatic or trichromatic color vision. Measurements of the spectral sensitivity of cones on this species were made on nine animals with the technique of electroretinogram (ERG) flicker photometry. Both the electrophysiological and the behavioral results suggest that there are four classes of cone pigment in this species. In addition to a short wavelength sensitive cone, apparently common to all tamarins, there are three classes of middle to long wavelength cone (lambda max = 545, 557 and 562 nm). Individual animals have either one or two of the latter types. The color vision variation in this species differs for males and females.