Vision: From Photon to Perception

A National Academy of Sciences colloquium entitled "Vision: From Photon to Perception" was held at the Beckman Center of the Academy in Irvine, California, on May 20-22, 1995. The meeting was organized by John Dowling, Lubert Stryer (chair), and Torsten Wiesel. The aim of the colloquium was to bring together leading scientists and students from different disciplines of vision research ranging from physics to psychology to define and explore the most challenging questions in the field. One hundred forty scientists participated in the colloquium. The major topics discussed were as follows. (i) How is light converted into a nerve signal? (ii) How are the outputs of rod and cone cells processed by the retina? (iii) How does the visual system develop and how did it evolve? (iv) How do we perceive color, depth, and motion?