CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 1,990Visual perception and processing mechanismsNeuroscience and Neuropharmacology ResearchRetinal Development and Disorders

What the frog's eye tells the frog's brain

Lettvin, J., Maturana, H., McCulloch, W., Pitts, W.·1959·Proceedings of the IRE
DOI 10.1109/jrproc.1959.287207
Open this paper in CoChat — free account

Abstract

In this paper, we analyze the activity of single fibers in the optic nerve of a frog. Our method is to find what sort of stimulus causes the largest activity in one nerve fiber and then what is the exciting aspect of that stimulus such that variations in everything else cause little change in the response. It has been known for the past 20 years that each fiber is connected not to a few rods and cones in the retina but to very many over a fair area. Our results show that for the most part within that area, it is not the light intensity itself but rather the pattern of local variation of intensity that is the exciting factor. There are four types of fibers, each type concerned with a different sort of pattern. Each type is uniformly distributed over the whole retina of the frog. Thus, there are four distinct parallel distributed channels whereby the frog's eye informs his brain about the visual image in terms of local pattern independent of average illumination. We describe the patterns and show the functional and anatomical separation of the channels. This work has been done on the frog, and our interpretation applies only to the frog.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1109/jrproc.1959.287207

Cites

13 of 13 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Claims the paper makes

This paper’s full text isn’t openly available, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • The frog retina contains circuitry sufficient to implement a kind of 'bug detector'.

    “for example, it is famously known that the frog retina contains circuitry sufficient to implement a kind of “bug detector” (Lettvin et al., 1959).”

    From Toward an integration of deep learning and neuroscience (2016) · cites this paper as Lettvin et al., 1959

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Lettvin, J., Maturana, H., McCulloch, W., & Pitts, W.
Affiliations
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (US)
Venue
Proceedings of the IRE
Publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
Published
1959-11
Volume
47
Issue
11
Pages
1940-1951
ISSN
0096-8390 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1109/jrproc.1959.287207
OpenAlex
W2118017998
Cited by
1,990
References
13
Citations by year
2026: 34 · 2025: 37 · 2024: 73 · 2023: 33 · 2022: 32 · 2021: 55 · 2020: 58 · 2019: 78 · 2018: 39 · 2017: 31 · 2016: 44 · 2015: 39 · 2014: 46 · 2013: 34 · 2012: 37
FWCI
18.38
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Licence
ieeexplore.ieee.org/Xplorehelp/downloads/license-information/IEEE.html (vor)
Locations
Proceedings of the IRE (publishedVersion)
Funders
Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Visual perception and processing mechanisms
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neuroscience and Neuropharmacology Research
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Retinal Development and Disorders
Keywords
optic nerve, frog retina, retinal ganglion cells, illumination invariance, rod and cone photoreceptors

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review