Chromatic masking in the (ΔL/L, ΔM/M) plane of cone-contrast space reveals only two detection mechanisms

The post-receptoral mechanisms that mediate detection of stimuli in the (ΔL/L, ΔM/M) plane of color space were characterized using noise masking. Chromatic masking noises of different chromaticities and spatial configurations were used, and threshold contours for the detection of Gaussian and Gabor tests were measured. The results do not show masking that is narrowly-selective for the chromaticity of the noise. On the contrary, our findings suggest that detection of these tests is mediated only by an opponent chromatic mechanism (a red-green mechanism) and a non-opponent luminance mechanism. These results are not consistent with the hypothesis of multiple chromatic mechanisms mediating detection in this color plane [1].