Parallel Processing in the Visual System

In the mid-sixties, researchers John Robson and Christina Enroth-Cugell revolutionized visual system studies by applying linear systems analysis to retinal ganglion cells in cats. They stimulated retinas with stripe patterns to observe cell responses, discovering that while some cells behaved predictably (termed "I cells"), most exhibited complex, nonlinear behaviors. These "D cells" generated transient impulses with changes in light distribution, regardless of total light flux, challenging existing theories and highlighting the intricacies of visual processing.