Latest news with #OzVisionSystem
Indian Express
22-04-2025
- Science
- Indian Express
Opinion In a black-and-white world, colour me olo
In 1856, an 18-year-old was trying to find the cure for malaria. Instead, he found a way to create the colour purple. William Henry Perkin, a student at London's Royal College of Chemistry, dipped a piece of cloth into his mixture of coal aniline and chromic acid. The cure for malaria was still about a century away, but what Perkin did discover was a way to create the first colour in synthetic form. Researchers from UC Berkeley and the University of Washington this week made a similar discovery. They had laser pulses fired into their eyes and claimed to have found 'olo', an 'incredibly saturated' blue-green, a colour 'never seen before by the human eye'. The discovery was made using a device called the Oz Vision System, named after Emerald City in L Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. The colour cannot be seen by the naked eye without laser stimulation. The scientists used the Oz to stimulate only the M (medium) cone cells in the eye, allowing them to view the colour. It was named 'olo' to denote the binary 010, indicating that of the three cone cells in the eye — L (long), M and S (short) — only one, the M, is stimulated. Scientists have argued that the discovery will be helpful in better understanding colour blindness and how the human brain visualises colour. But it has also been contested because of its limited value. After all, what is a new colour when only a few people can see it? If not material or scientific value, olo certainly seems to add philosophical value to the understanding of the world. In a world given to viewing the Other in strict binaries of black and white, olo, with its blue-green timbre and contested existence, shows that there is always room for ambiguity. It also comes with a simple lesson: There is value in looking at things through someone else's eyes. You may just discover something new.
Metro
21-04-2025
- Science
- Metro
The 'new colour' discovered by scientists has a very curious name meaning
Finding a new colour is the sort of thing you might wonder about if you took ayahuasca (we imagine) but scientists say they have actually managed to do it. You won't be able to see it just on a walk into town, however. It only became visible after special lasers were shined into their eyes, specially designed to only activate certain cone cells which determine our colour vision. The resulting hue was similar to green or turquoise, but so vibrant it could not otherwise be experienced. We haven't seen it either, so we'll have to take their word for it: the above colour block is what they said it came closest to, but it still wasn't that. Describing the mind-bending discovery in the journal Science Advances on Friday, they said it was 'blue-green of unprecedented saturation', which was 'beyond the natural human gamut' and had been formally measured with colour matching by the human researchers. They said it's not the only 'new colour' which could exist, either, as theoretically colours that are even more unlike what we know could be seen using the method. Woah. The researchers clearly had poetic minds, as they thought carefully about what to name their laser machine and the resulting 'novel' colour. They used a machine called 'Oz Vision System' to stimulate the cone cells, a reference to the magical Emerald City visited by Dorothy in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. In this city, far away from the dusty plains of Kansas where she started the story, everything is green and sparkling. Similarly, looking at 'Oz' colours – compared to the boring old green you see when you look at trees or the sea on a sunny day – is like being in a magical new world of possibility. Turning to the 'new colour' itself, it has been named 'Olo'. This also has a hidden meaning, as researchers named it after the binary code 010. Eyes have three types of cone cells: S, L, and M, which are each sensitive to different colour wavelengths blue, red, and green. To make the five subjects see the new colour, Oz only stimulated the cells responsive to green. So Olo, or 010, means two types of the three cone cells were not stimulated, but only one was. Not everyone thinks so, and even the researchers themselves from UC Berkeley and the University of Washington say they only achieved 'a partial expansion of colorspace'. Although 'Olo' itself has grabbed the headlines, they think the process they used to create its appearance is actually the more interesting aspect. This is because it could be used to create many other colour perceptions too, potentially even finding a truly new colour. The current study is just 'proof of principle' and 'theoretically, novel colors are possible through bypassing the constraints set by the cone spectral sensitivities and activating M cone cells exclusively'. As well as potentially allowing for more 'novel' colours to be perceived, researchers believe it could have practical issues too. More Trending They say it could help us understand more about how eyes take in colour, and the machine they used 'will enable diverse new experiments'. Ultimately, they want to be able to control the photoreceptors in the retina (the cells that sense liught and colour). It could even help us understand colour blindness better and try to prompt 'full trichromatic color vision in a red-green colorblind person'. Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@ For more stories like this, check our news page. MORE: Artist of portrait that wound up Trump says her business may never recover MORE: Who is Banksy? What we know after new London artwork emerges MORE: Map shows where to see Banksy's best graffiti in London after new artwork found
Yahoo
21-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Scientists discover new colour ‘olo' - and there's a link to ‘The Wizard of Oz'
Scientists claim they have discovered a new colour called 'olo'. The snag is that it's only ever been witnessed by five people in the world – and cannot be seen by the naked eye. Indeed, the colour, said to be a saturated shade of blue-green, cannot be seen without the help of stimulation by laser. The researchers from UC Berkeley and the University of Washington had laser pulses fired into their eyes. This Oz Vision System technique, named in homage to the Emerald City in L. Frank Baum's novel 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz' (and the subsequent 1939 film starring Judy Garland), can allow people to see beyond the normal gamut of colour perception. The study, published in the journal Science Advances, states that when Oz laser signals are intentionally 'jittered' by just a few microns (one millionth of a metre) subjects perceive the stimulating laser's natural colour. There are three types of cone cells in the eye – S (short), L (long) and M (medium) - each one sensitive to different wavelengths of light. By stimulating only M cones, the five participants claim to have witnessed a blue-green colour that scientists have called "olo" - denoting the binary 010. The paper read: 'We name this new color 'olo'. Subjects report that olo in our prototype system appears blue-green of unprecedented saturation, when viewed relative to a neutral grey background. Subjects find that they must desaturate olo by adding white light before they can achieve a colour match with the closest monochromatic light, which lies on the boundary of the gamut, unequivocal proof that olo lies beyond the gamut.' The study's co-author, Professor Ren Ng from the University of California, has described the findings as "jaw-dropping". 'We predicted from the beginning that it would look like an unprecedented colour signal but we didn't know what the brain would do with it,' said Professor Ng. 'It was jaw-dropping. It's incredibly saturated.' Prof Ng told BBC's Radio 4's Today programme that olo was "more saturated than any colour that you can see in the real world". "Let's say you go around your whole life and you see only pink, baby pink, a pastel pink," he said. "And then one day you go to the office and someone's wearing a shirt, and it's the most intense baby pink you've ever seen, and they say it's a new colour and we call it red." While it does not fully capture the colour, the researchers shared an image of a turquoise square to give a sense of the hue: However, they stressed that the colour could only be experienced through laser manipulation of the retina. The claim of a new colour has been contested, however. 'It is not a new colour,' said John Barbur, a vision scientist at City St George's, University of London. 'It's a more saturated green that can only be produced in a subject with normal red-green chromatic mechanism when the only input comes from M cones.' The work, while a 'technological feat', has 'limited value' according to Barbur. The authors of the study disagree. They believe 'Oz' will help them delve into how the brain creates visual perceptions of the world. As reported by the BBC, it may also allow them to learn more about colour blindness or diseases that affect vision. Well, there's no place like home... Sorry, no colour like olo. Dorothy would be proud.
Yahoo
21-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Scientists discover new colour ‘olo' - and there's a link to ‘The Wizard of Oz'
Scientists claim they have discovered a new colour called 'olo'. The snag is that it's only ever been witnessed by five people in the world – and cannot be seen by the naked eye. Indeed, the colour, said to be a saturated shade of blue-green, cannot be seen without the help of stimulation by laser. The researchers from UC Berkeley and the University of Washington had laser pulses fired into their eyes. This Oz Vision System technique, named in homage to the Emerald City in L. Frank Baum's novel 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz' (and the subsequent 1939 film starring Judy Garland), can allow people to see beyond the normal gamut of colour perception. The study, published in the journal Science Advances, states that when Oz laser signals are intentionally 'jittered' by just a few microns (one millionth of a metre) subjects perceive the stimulating laser's natural colour. There are three types of cone cells in the eye – S (short), L (long) and M (medium) - each one sensitive to different wavelengths of light. By stimulating only M cones, the five participants claim to have witnessed a blue-green colour that scientists have called "olo" - denoting the binary 010. The paper read: 'We name this new color 'olo'. Subjects report that olo in our prototype system appears blue-green of unprecedented saturation, when viewed relative to a neutral grey background. Subjects find that they must desaturate olo by adding white light before they can achieve a colour match with the closest monochromatic light, which lies on the boundary of the gamut, unequivocal proof that olo lies beyond the gamut.' The study's co-author, Professor Ren Ng from the University of California, has described the findings as "jaw-dropping". 'We predicted from the beginning that it would look like an unprecedented colour signal but we didn't know what the brain would do with it,' said Professor Ng. 'It was jaw-dropping. It's incredibly saturated.' Prof Ng told BBC's Radio 4's Today programme that olo was "more saturated than any colour that you can see in the real world". "Let's say you go around your whole life and you see only pink, baby pink, a pastel pink," he said. "And then one day you go to the office and someone's wearing a shirt, and it's the most intense baby pink you've ever seen, and they say it's a new colour and we call it red." While it does not fully capture the colour, the researchers shared an image of a turquoise square to give a sense of the hue: However, they stressed that the colour could only be experienced through laser manipulation of the retina. The claim of a new colour has been contested, however. 'It is not a new colour,' said John Barbur, a vision scientist at City St George's, University of London. 'It's a more saturated green that can only be produced in a subject with normal red-green chromatic mechanism when the only input comes from M cones.' The work, while a 'technological feat', has 'limited value' according to Barbur. The authors of the study disagree. They believe 'Oz' will help them delve into how the brain creates visual perceptions of the world. As reported by the BBC, it may also allow them to learn more about colour blindness or diseases that affect vision. Well, there's no place like home... Sorry, no colour like olo. Dorothy would be proud.
Euronews
21-04-2025
- Science
- Euronews
Scientists discover new colour ‘olo' - and there's a link to ‘The Wizard of Oz'
ADVERTISEMENT Scientists claim they have discovered a new colour called 'olo'. The snag is that it's only ever been witnessed by five people in the world – and cannot be seen by the naked eye. Indeed, the colour, said to be a saturated shade of blue-green, cannot be seen without the help of stimulation by laser. The researchers from UC Berkeley and the University of Washington had laser pulses fired into their eyes. This Oz Vision System technique, named in homage to the Emerald City in L. Frank Baum's novel 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz' (and the subsequent 1939 film starring Judy Garland), can allow people to see beyond the normal gamut of colour perception. The study, published in the journal Science Advances , states that when Oz laser signals are intentionally 'jittered' by just a few microns (one millionth of a metre) subjects perceive the stimulating laser's natural colour. The Emerald City in 'The Wizard of Oz' MGM-Warner Bros. There are three types of cone cells in the eye – S (short), L (long) and M (medium) - each one sensitive to different wavelengths of light. By stimulating only M cones, the five participants claim to have witnessed a blue-green colour that scientists have called "olo" - denoting the binary 010. The paper read: 'We name this new color 'olo'. Subjects report that olo in our prototype system appears blue-green of unprecedented saturation, when viewed relative to a neutral grey background. Subjects find that they must desaturate olo by adding white light before they can achieve a colour match with the closest monochromatic light, which lies on the boundary of the gamut, unequivocal proof that olo lies beyond the gamut.' The study's co-author, Professor Ren Ng from the University of California, has described the findings as "jaw-dropping". 'We predicted from the beginning that it would look like an unprecedented colour signal but we didn't know what the brain would do with it,' said Professor Ng. 'It was jaw-dropping. It's incredibly saturated.' Prof Ng told BBC's Radio 4's Today programme that olo was "more saturated than any colour that you can see in the real world". "Let's say you go around your whole life and you see only pink, baby pink, a pastel pink," he said. "And then one day you go to the office and someone's wearing a shirt, and it's the most intense baby pink you've ever seen, and they say it's a new colour and we call it red." While it does not fully capture the colour, the researchers shared an image of a turquoise square to give a sense of the hue: Scientists say olo was best matched by this blue green colour square Science Advances However, they stressed that the colour could only be experienced through laser manipulation of the retina. The claim of a new colour has been contested, however. 'It is not a new colour,' said John Barbur, a vision scientist at City St George's, University of London. 'It's a more saturated green that can only be produced in a subject with normal red-green chromatic mechanism when the only input comes from M cones.' ADVERTISEMENT The work, while a 'technological feat', has 'limited value' according to Barbur. The authors of the study disagree. They believe 'Oz' will help them delve into how the brain creates visual perceptions of the world. As reported by the BBC, it may also allow them to learn more about colour blindness or diseases that affect vision. Well, there's no place like home... Sorry, no colour like olo. Dorothy would be proud. ADVERTISEMENT
