Scotopic colour vision in nocturnal hawkmoths
Kelber, Almut LU ; Balkenius, Anna LU and Warrant, Eric LU
(2002)
In Nature
419(6910).
p.922-925
- Abstract
- Humans are colour-blind at night, and it has been assumed that this is true of all animals. But colour vision is as useful for discriminating objects1 at night as it is during the day. Here we show, through behavioural experiments, that the nocturnal hawkmoth Deilephila elpenor uses colour vision to discriminate coloured stimuli at intensities corresponding to dim starlight (0.0001 cd m-2). It can do this even if the illumination colour changes, thereby showing colour constancya property of true colour vision systems2. In identical conditions humans are completely colour-blind. Our calculations show that the possession of three photoreceptor classes reduces the absolute sensitivity of the eye, which indicates that colour vision has a high... (More)
- Humans are colour-blind at night, and it has been assumed that this is true of all animals. But colour vision is as useful for discriminating objects1 at night as it is during the day. Here we show, through behavioural experiments, that the nocturnal hawkmoth Deilephila elpenor uses colour vision to discriminate coloured stimuli at intensities corresponding to dim starlight (0.0001 cd m-2). It can do this even if the illumination colour changes, thereby showing colour constancya property of true colour vision systems2. In identical conditions humans are completely colour-blind. Our calculations show that the possession of three photoreceptor classes reduces the absolute sensitivity of the eye, which indicates that colour vision has a high ecological relevance in nocturnal moths. In addition, the photoreceptors of a single ommatidium absorb too few photons for reliable discrimination, indicating that spatial and/or temporal summation must occur for colour vision to be possible. Taken together, our results show that colour vision occurs at nocturnal intensities in a biologically relevant context (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/131382
- author
- Kelber, Almut
LU
; Balkenius, Anna
LU
and Warrant, Eric
LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2002
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- in
- Nature
- volume
- 419
- issue
- 6910
- pages
- 922 - 925
- publisher
- Nature Publishing Group
- external identifiers
-
- pmid:12410310
- wos:000178909700043
- scopus:0037206867
- ISSN
- 0028-0836
- DOI
- 10.1038/nature01065
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 308383e9-08cb-449c-96a4-eb9ec2e5f1c5 (old id 131382)
- date added to LUP
- 2016-04-01 11:48:40
- date last changed
- 2022-04-28 20:17:18
@article{308383e9-08cb-449c-96a4-eb9ec2e5f1c5,
abstract = {{Humans are colour-blind at night, and it has been assumed that this is true of all animals. But colour vision is as useful for discriminating objects1 at night as it is during the day. Here we show, through behavioural experiments, that the nocturnal hawkmoth Deilephila elpenor uses colour vision to discriminate coloured stimuli at intensities corresponding to dim starlight (0.0001 cd m-2). It can do this even if the illumination colour changes, thereby showing colour constancya property of true colour vision systems2. In identical conditions humans are completely colour-blind. Our calculations show that the possession of three photoreceptor classes reduces the absolute sensitivity of the eye, which indicates that colour vision has a high ecological relevance in nocturnal moths. In addition, the photoreceptors of a single ommatidium absorb too few photons for reliable discrimination, indicating that spatial and/or temporal summation must occur for colour vision to be possible. Taken together, our results show that colour vision occurs at nocturnal intensities in a biologically relevant context}},
author = {{Kelber, Almut and Balkenius, Anna and Warrant, Eric}},
issn = {{0028-0836}},
language = {{eng}},
number = {{6910}},
pages = {{922--925}},
publisher = {{Nature Publishing Group}},
series = {{Nature}},
title = {{Scotopic colour vision in nocturnal hawkmoths}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature01065}},
doi = {{10.1038/nature01065}},
volume = {{419}},
year = {{2002}},
}