Skip to main content

Lund University Publications

LUND UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

Cephalopod versus vertebrate eyes

Nilsson, Dan E. LU ; Johnsen, Sönke and Warrant, Eric LU orcid (2023) In Current Biology 33(20). p.1100-1105
Abstract

Vertebrates and cephalopods are the two major animal groups that view the world through sophisticated camera-type eyes. There are of course exceptions: nautiloid cephalopods have more simply built pinhole eyes. Excellent camera type eyes are also found in other animals, such as some spider groups, a few snails, and certain marine worms, but the vast majority of large camera-type eyes belong to cephalopods and vertebrates. Vertebrates and cephalopods also devote major parts of their brains to the processing of visual information. Obviously, there are differences in eye performance among cephalopods and vertebrates, but there are no major subgroups where vision seems to have low priority. The similarity in eye geometry is striking,... (More)

Vertebrates and cephalopods are the two major animal groups that view the world through sophisticated camera-type eyes. There are of course exceptions: nautiloid cephalopods have more simply built pinhole eyes. Excellent camera type eyes are also found in other animals, such as some spider groups, a few snails, and certain marine worms, but the vast majority of large camera-type eyes belong to cephalopods and vertebrates. Vertebrates and cephalopods also devote major parts of their brains to the processing of visual information. Obviously, there are differences in eye performance among cephalopods and vertebrates, but there are no major subgroups where vision seems to have low priority. The similarity in eye geometry is striking, especially between fish and coleoid cephalopods, with a hemispherical retina centred around a spherical lens. Do these similarities mean that vertebrate and cephalopod eyes are equally good? Comparing the eyes of vertebrates and cephalopods reveals many fundamental differences with surprisingly small consequences for vision, but also one difference that means that cephalopods and vertebrates do not share the same visual world.

(Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Current Biology
volume
33
issue
20
pages
1100 - 1105
publisher
Elsevier
external identifiers
  • pmid:37875092
  • scopus:85174455838
ISSN
0960-9822
DOI
10.1016/j.cub.2023.07.049
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
f1ab9c2f-c8c3-4782-9914-21cee0508725
date added to LUP
2023-12-11 15:20:26
date last changed
2024-04-24 08:49:26
@article{f1ab9c2f-c8c3-4782-9914-21cee0508725,
  abstract     = {{<p>Vertebrates and cephalopods are the two major animal groups that view the world through sophisticated camera-type eyes. There are of course exceptions: nautiloid cephalopods have more simply built pinhole eyes. Excellent camera type eyes are also found in other animals, such as some spider groups, a few snails, and certain marine worms, but the vast majority of large camera-type eyes belong to cephalopods and vertebrates. Vertebrates and cephalopods also devote major parts of their brains to the processing of visual information. Obviously, there are differences in eye performance among cephalopods and vertebrates, but there are no major subgroups where vision seems to have low priority. The similarity in eye geometry is striking, especially between fish and coleoid cephalopods, with a hemispherical retina centred around a spherical lens. Do these similarities mean that vertebrate and cephalopod eyes are equally good? Comparing the eyes of vertebrates and cephalopods reveals many fundamental differences with surprisingly small consequences for vision, but also one difference that means that cephalopods and vertebrates do not share the same visual world.</p>}},
  author       = {{Nilsson, Dan E. and Johnsen, Sönke and Warrant, Eric}},
  issn         = {{0960-9822}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{20}},
  pages        = {{1100--1105}},
  publisher    = {{Elsevier}},
  series       = {{Current Biology}},
  title        = {{Cephalopod versus vertebrate eyes}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2023.07.049}},
  doi          = {{10.1016/j.cub.2023.07.049}},
  volume       = {{33}},
  year         = {{2023}},
}