A person can see in the infrared spectrum. Free Technical Library News

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A person can see in the infrared spectrum

08.12.2014

Scientists from the University of Washington have found that under certain conditions, the retina of the human eye can see infrared light.

The researchers noticed that at a high frequency of infrared pulses, retinal cells receive a double portion of light and at this moment the eye can detect light that goes beyond the visible spectrum. The data obtained during the experiments can be used to stimulate individual areas of the retina during its diagnosis.

The scientists used a powerful infrared laser. In experiments with laser pulses of varying lengths that contained the same number of photons, they found that the shorter the pulse, the more likely it was to be seen by the eye. The photon is absorbed by the retina, which then creates a photopigment that converts light into vision, but typically only one photon is absorbed by each of the photopigments.

However, if you pack several photons into one short pulse of a rapidly pulsing laser, there is a certain chance that one photopigment will simultaneously capture two photons and the combined energy of the two light quanta will activate the pigment, and allow the eye to see what is normally invisible. The visible spectrum includes 400-720 nm wavelengths of light, and if a pigment molecule in the retina simultaneously captures a pair of 1000-nm photons, the light particles deliver the same amount of energy as a single 500-nm photon seen in the ordinary spectrum: thus we can see infrared light.

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