Dyop® - Dynamic Optotype™

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Introducing the Dyop®

The “Revolutionary” Method for Measuring Acuity (Visual Clarity)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Click here for the Dyop Video

 

 Click HERE for "How We See"

 

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 “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”
- Arthur C. Clarke’s Third Law

 

“Technology is our word for stuff we don’t understand.”

Douglas Adams

 

When you see images on your computer monitor, tablet screen, or SmartPhone, you think that you are seeing letters or words or lines or shapes.  What you are actually seeing are “scanning lines” of pixels of light moving rapidly across the screen in combinations of red, green, and blue.  The dynamic motion of those moving pixels keeps the image from burning itself into the screen of the monitor. 

 

Vision is a dynamic process inherent in all animals.  Our bodies and eyes are biological machines, and the world we see is dynamic, NOT static.  Our eyes developed as sensors to detect motion, distance, and colors, to enable us to detect predators and game, and to eat rather than be eaten.   To be effective and efficient, vision has to be a dynamic and autonomic process, where we are totally unaware of the visual process mechanics. 

 

As you are reading this, you think you are seeing lines and shapes and letters.  Instead you are seeing pixels of electronic light generated by the phosphors within the surface of your computer screen or SmartPhone and perceived by the photoreceptors in the back of your retina.  However, much like the “scanning lines” on an electronic display, vision is a dynamic process. The dynamic motion of those moving pixels keeps the image from burning itself into the screen of the monitor.  Much like the pixels of light being in motion, the retina photoreceptors in the back of the eye are moving as a result of the saccade process.  Those retina photoreceptors combine the dynamic responses (primarily of the colors Red, Green, and Blue) into giving you the illusion of vision. 

 

 

Chromatic Triangulation

Wavelengths of light

Light reaching the Photoreceptors

Photoreceptors as Pixels

 

 

When you look at an object, the biological lens changes its shape to focus the image (a process called accommodation) on the back center of the retina.  For a distance images, the lens is thin.  For near images, the lens has to become more rounded to bend the light.  That accommodation process of the lens changing its shape is part of Dynamic Visual Acuity keeps your eyes refreshed when you look at letters or words or lines or shapes due to the inherent vibrations of the photoreceptors provided by the visual saccades.  The saccades allow the photoreceptors to be refreshed (equivalent to a shutter speed of about 0.33 arc minutes squared per second) and provide a dynamic response (primarily of the colors red, green, and blue) to give you the illusion of vision. 

 

 

The disparate focal depths for Red, Green and Blue (where Red is focused BEHIND the retina, Green ON the retina, and Blue in FRONT of the retina) also provide Chromatic Triangulation to regulate the shape of the lens of the eye and the relative focal depth of the image being viewed.  However, HOW YOU SEE is affected by the ratio of the Red vs. Green photoreceptors in your eye. 

 

A higher ratio of Red/Green photoreceptors (75% Red and 20% Green) provides a more stable distance image but a more unstable near image.  A more balanced ratio of Red vs. Green photoreceptors (50% Red and 45% Green) provides a more stable near image.  A High-Red-Ratio Vision (75% Red and 20% Green) is associated with enabling the ability able to spot predators and game, and with cultures which use pictographic writing.  A Balanced-Red-Ratio Vision (50% Red and 45% Green) is associated with cultures that use letter-based words and “Western technology.”   That unstable near-image process of High-Red-Ratio Vision is typically associated with symptoms of dyslexia, migraines, and epilepsy.

Response to colors by the biological lens

Chromatic Triangulation has Green Focused ON the retina  

 

Over-Compensation has Green IN FRONT OF the retina

Balanced-Red-Ratio Vision = 50% Red, 45% Green, 5% Blue

Balanced-Red-Ratio Vision vs.

High-Red-Ratio Vision

Over-Compensation has Green FRONT the retina

High-Red-Ratio Vision = 75% Red, 20% Green, 5% Blue

 

 

Dynamic Visual Acuity is provided by the vibratory motion of the visual saccades, which refresh the responsiveness of the photoreceptors located in the back of the retina, much like the pixel scanning lines on an electronic display.  That photoreceptor refresh in turn allows the neurons on the inner surface of the retina to act as the equivalent of a biological circuit board. It also allows the photoreceptors to use the constantly changing chromatic triangulation of the blue, green, and red focal depths to regulate acuity.  

 

The eye functions to receive visual stimuli and be self-regulating as to acuity.  The retina of the eye functions as a biological computer which perceives strobic stimuli via the saccade process rather than just as a transmitter of lines and shapes to the brain via the optic nerves.

 

Much like a camera sending images to a memory chip, the eye functions as a pixelized source of retina stimuli to create vision and bring that image into focus.  Twenty-first century digital cameras use computerized electronic pixels which respond to the colors and intensity to create the images we see.  In the eye, the response of about 100 photoreceptors is merged into every optic nerve going to the brain.  The photoreceptors of the eye function like computerized pixels with the photoreceptor refresh rate and the saccade process providing much of the refresh mechanism.  The saccade process exists primarily to provide a refresh period for the photoreceptors when looking at static images to avoid photoreceptor stimulus extinction.

As a result of the varying focal depths for colors, "relaxed vision" for some trichromats has Green focused on the retina and Red focused behind the retina.  That learned Red/Green acuity focal depth response regulates acuity and accommodation.  Rather than accommodation being regulated by the length of the eye, the adjustment as to accommodation is the learned response as to the comparative focal depth for Red and Green.  The deceptive factor of Black/White acuity measurement is that it masks the mechanics of accommodation regulation. 

In his 2011 Proctor Lecture presentation Dr. Richard Masland described retina functioning as being similar to a "biological computer" with the photoreceptors functioning much as binary switches.

 

http://www.dyop.info/documents/Retinal_cells-Masland_ProcterLecture.pdf

 

A simple illustration of the functioning of dynamic vision and photoreceptor depletion is The Lilac Chaser Illusion.  When you fixate on the Plus (+) in the center of the ring of Pink circles below, you likely see the Pink circles seeming to rotate around that Plus.  But it is also likely that you will see a single moving Green circle which appears to spin around the plus.  The illusion of the Green circle appearing is because of the depletion of the Red photoreceptor refresh resulting in the inability to “see” the color Red and creating the illusion (delusion) that the depleted photoreceptor area is seeing a Green circle.  The other two illusions illustrate the creation of cognition (Open Your Eyes) even if it isn’t there, and the refresh effect of the saccades to create an illusion of motion (Moving Dimple Pattern) even when it isn’t there.

 

 

The Lilac Chaser Illusion

 

 

Open Your Eyes

    The Lilac Chaser Illusion

Moving Dimple Pattern

 

 

 

The Dyop Tests

 

Dyop® (pronounced “di-op and short for dynamic optotype) is spinning segmented ring used as a visual target (optotype).  A Dyop functions similar to visual tuning fork to precisely, consistently, and efficiently benchmark your acuity (visual clarity) using Dynamic Resolution Acuity rather than “traditional” Static Recognition Acuity of letter-based tests.  The gaps and segments of the spinning Dyop create a strobic binary stimulus of the photoreceptors of your eye.  When the gap AREA of a spinning Dyop gets too small, that strobic visual stimulus area is too small for the photoreceptors to detect that gap motion.  The smallest diameter Dyop ring, where the direction of the gaps spinning motion is detected, benchmarks acuity (visual clarity) and may be used to determine refractions.  It also allows the precise measurement of vision in color, vision in children and infants, and vision in non-literate individuals.

 

 

 

Dyop Components

Item 1 – the Dynamic Visual Acuity angular movement/velocity for the strobic contrast response (40 RPM optimum) with a 0.33 arc minute squared per second Resonance Acuity refresh rate.

Item 2 – the moving segmented 0.54 arc minute squared Minimum Area of Resolution (MAR) for dynamically stimulating a 20 photoreceptor cluster for Dynamic Visual Acuity

Item 3 – retinal photoreceptor cell clusters

Item 4 – examples of a historic Static Visual Acuity optotypes (Recognition Acuity or Resolution Acuity).

Item 5the static 1.0 arc minute squared Minimum Area (MAR) of a 40 retina photoreceptor cluster for a historic Static Visual Acuity optotype

 

Prototype Dyop Test

 

The strobic stimulus of the spinning Black/White-on-Gray Dyop gaps/segments functions as a (binary) on/off switch to stimulate the photoreceptors facilitating Resonance Acuity in response to the photoreceptors saccade refresh movements.  The strobic Dyop stimulus lets you sense the pixel response to the images you are seeing.  The acuity endpoint is the smallest diameter where the direction of spinning can be detected.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

20/22

 

20/20

 

20/18

 

1862 Snellen Vision Testing

 

21st Century Dyop® Vision Testing

 

 

How We See

Click here for the How We See White Paper

 

Current vision “standards” use Static Visual Acuity based upon the 1862 cultural ability to detect the size and differences between static letters such as “E” and “C.”  As a result, it mistakes cognition for acuity, and improperly and imprecisely “measures” vision.  Because vision is actually a dynamic process, using Static Visual Acuity, and static targets to measure vision, depletes the response of the photoreceptors, is inherently imprecise and unnecessarily inefficient, and tends to produce an overminused (excess spherical power) refraction.

 

“Classical” letter-based vision tests use a theoretical gap stimulus area (the Minimum AREA of Resolution - MAR) of 1.0 arc minutes squared.   That letter-based stimulus AREA is almost twice the size of the empirically derived 0.54 arc minutes squared Dyop actual Minimum AREA of Resolution.  Static letter-based tests are also inherently imprecise because they use the cognition of cultural shapes to benchmark vision rather than the actual physiological response of the eye.  Cognition of European-type letters based letters become a guessing game for both the doctor and patient and measures conceptual processing by the patient as much as it does visual clarity. 

 

The strobic stimulus of the spinning Black/White-on-Gray Dyop gap/segments functions as a (binary) on/off switch to stimulate the photoreceptors.  As the stimulus area of the Dyop gap/segment AREA becomes too small, that stimulus area becomes smaller than the minimum AREA of photoreceptor visual resolution.  The angular arc width of the smallest diameter Dyop ring detected as spinning creates an acuity endpoint which provides a precise, accurate, and efficient method of measuring visual acuity. That precise acuity endpoint also creates optimum values for sphere, cylinder, and axis and aids in avoiding an overminused refraction.

 

That 10% stroke width and 40 RPM rotation rate also seem to be the optimum values for Dyop attributes and maximizing its precision and accuracy.

 

The “optimum Dyop” has a 10% stroke width with 8 uniformly spaced gaps and 8 contrasting segments and a 40 RPM rotation rate which creates a 0.54 arc minutes squared stimulus area (Minimum Area of Resolution – MAR). 

 

 

The “optimum Dyop” also correlates to a Dyop being up to six times as precise as Snellen testing, with one-sixth the variance, up to three times as efficient, can measure acuity regardless of the subjects level of literacy or culture, and can measure acuity in color.  That more precise stimulus area results in a Dyop acuity having a linear increase in diameter and diopters of blur versus Snellen testing typically have a logarithmic increase in height with diopters of blur. 

 

 

The smallest Dyop gap/segment stimulus area detected as spinning as the minimum visual stimulus threshold area (Minimum AREA of Resolution - MAR) of 0.54 arc minutes squared correlates to about 20 photoreceptors.  That threshold is significantly more precise, consistent, and efficient than staring at letters.  The actual direction of Dyop spinning is irrelevant.  That detection of spinning also lets the Dyop test be used for individuals who “can’t read,” infants and young children, and individuals with letter-processing problems such as dyslexia. 

 

The current global “standard” for measuring vision was developed in 1862, and is based upon the cultural ability of Europeans to detect the size and differences between static letters such as “E” and “C.”  As a result it mistakes cognition for acuity, it improperly and imprecisely “measures” vision, it is culturally biased, and it is dependent upon the subject having letter-based literacy.

 

“Classical” Static and letter-based vision tests use a theoretical gap stimulus area (the Minimum AREA of Resolution) of 1.0 arc minutes squared.   That letter-based stimulus AREA is larger than the empirically derived 0.54 arc minutes squared Dyop actual Minimum AREA of Resolution.  That Static MAR correlates to a cluster of about 40 photoreceptors.

 

Static letter-based tests are also inherently imprecise because they use the cognition of cultural shapes to benchmark vision rather than the actual physiological response of the eye.  Cognition of European-type letters based letters become a guessing game for both the doctor and patient and measures conceptual processing by the patient as much as it does visual clarity.

 

Until now, however, how we see and how our eyes adjusts its visual focus has remained a mystery.

 

Your eyes function similar to the pixels receptors of a computerized video camera.  The eye’s photoreceptors not only allow you to see in color (primarily Red, Green and Blue), but the refresh rate of the photoreceptors, the saccade process, and the matrix response of the photoreceptors allow you to track changes in the location of those images.  The response of about 100 photoreceptors combines to create the stimulus for each optic nerve fiber going to the brain which creates vision and brings that image into focus.  However, the neural ganglia layer of the retina “process” those photoreceptor responses in clusters of about 20 photoreceptors much as a biological circuit board with the emphasis on patterns of motion and proximity.  The comparative focal depth of the red, green, and blue colors of the images also regulates the shape of the biological lens and adjusts focal clarity.

 

The strobic stimulus of the spinning Black/White-on-Gray Dyop gap/segments functions as a (binary) on/off switch to stimulate the photoreceptors.  As the stimulus area of the Dyop gap/segment AREA becomes too small, that stimulus area becomes smaller than the minimum AREA of photoreceptor visual resolution.  The angular arc width of the smallest diameter Dyop ring detected as spinning creates an acuity endpoint which provides a precise, accurate, and efficient method of measuring visual acuity. That precise acuity endpoint also creates optimum values for sphere, cylinder, and axis and aids in avoiding an overminused refraction.

 

The retinal pixel process is similar to the display of a television or your computer.  Detecting the spinning gaps/segments is similar to detecting the electronic pixels.  Computer pixels are so small that, unless you are close enough, you only see lines or shapes and NOT the pixels.

 

As the spinning gap/segment area of a Dyop gets too small due to the angular width of the ring getting smaller, that gap/segment photoreceptor stimulus area becomes too small for the photoreceptor clusters to detect that motion.  That smallest Dyop stimulus area detected as spinning creates a visual clarity threshold (acuity endpoint) and is a cluster area of about 20 photoreceptors.  That Dyop acuity and refraction endpoint is also significantly more precise than staring at letters inherent in the Snellen test because it is functionally about half the area (0.54 arc minutes squared) than the 1.0 arc minute squared average Snellen stimulus area.  The ability to detect motion is also a survival tool as critical as detecting the size of the image itself.

 

We See in Color

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Black/White

 

Red

Green

Blue

 

Color Acuity can also be used for diagnostic tests

 

See www.redgreenscreening.com for the details and that Dyop test.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blue

Black/White

Green

 

 

 

 

Certain Dyop color/contrast combinations can also be used to screen for potential symptoms of dyslexia, migraines, and epilepsy.  

Rather than accommodation being regulated by the length of the eye, the adjustment as to accommodation is the learned response as to the comparative focal depth for Red and Green.  The deceptive factor of Black/White acuity measurement is that it masks the mechanics of accommodation regulation. 

 

- - - - - - -

 

The History of Vision Measurement

 

Thousands of years ago, visual clarity (acuity) was defined by the ability to see the nighttime gap between two of the smaller stars in the handle of the Big Dipper constellation.

 

Static Resolution Acuity

Static Recognition Acuity

Dynamic Dyop Acuity

 

In 1862 Dutch Ophthalmologist Herman Snellen used the ability to identify (European) letters as the benchmark for visual acuity.  Reading had become a dominant economic and social skill in Europe.  Snellen used the convenience of black letters on a white background as the benchmark although most of what we see is NOT in black and white and other cultures use pictographs rather than letter-based words.

 

While twenty first century technology is letter-based technology, today’s visual acuity is primarily measured by the clarity and ability to read text on an electronic display.  Unfortunately, vision science has not kept up with the precision and demands of those 21st century visual needs.  The use of Dynamic Visual Acuity to provide increased precision, increased consistency, and increased efficiency of the Dyop® tests are intended as a global replacement for Static Visual Acuity letter-based tests such as Snellen, Sloan, and Landolt optotypes, and provide a more universal and efficient method of vision measurement.

 

Origin of the Dyop® Concept

http://www.dyop.info/documents/Origin_of_Dyops.pdf

 

The ADDED problem of a less than Optimum Refraction is that it impairs cognition as well as vision.

http://www.induceddyslexia.com/

 

This is especially significant now that we are no longer in the Age of Information or the Age of Information Overload

but we are now in the Age of Comprehension

 

The scientific and commercialization benefits of the Dyop concept are due to its increased precision, consistency, efficiency, and broader range of vision test attributes, and universal patient acceptance versus "conventional" (1862) static-letter-visual testing.

 

The “Perfect Storm of mis-prescriptions” which led to the Dyop Tests


The dynamic optotype, or Dyop®, discovery grew out of an inappropriate refraction.  The Dyop concept was developed as an attempt to explain four years of unintentional refractive overminus (excess spherical power), and the resulting negative visual, financial, and psychological effects from that overminus.  What was discovered was a visual acuity and refraction test which was significantly more precise and efficient that Snellen/Sloan/Landolt testing, and that there was an inherent tendency of static Snellen/Sloan/Landolt tests to create an overminused refraction.  This possible explanation of visual accommodation is an outgrowth of trying to explain how and why the dynamic optotype, or Dyop, test works.

 

 

http://www.dyop.info/documents/Allan'sProductivity=1988_to_2008.pdf

This Dyop "personal research history" is anecdotal.  However, all of the discoveries and research has been peer-review validated by academically trained optometry professors.  Their research was also provided at NO charge due to their scientific curiosity and the potential of improving visual processes.  The goal of the anecdotal research has been have those discoveries reproducible and simple enough so that they could be peer-review validated.  The nature of the discoveries and the scientific validation has been stunning and delightful.

 

The observations which followed over the next ten years are from discovering how and why that Snellen-generated overminus occurred.

 

It is easy to detect an image which needs a more spherical lens power because it will appear blurry.  It is more difficult to detect an image which has too much spherical power because the image will appear to be hyper-crisp.  The advantage of a Dyop test versus static images is that the Dyop arc width diameter will reach a minimum when the combination of the optimum sphere, cylinder, and axis is achieved.

 

The inherent tendency to fixate on static images during vision testing tends to result in a measurement with excess visual sphere.  Eyeglass and contact wearers tend to NOT be aware of their overminus.

The "optimum" Dyop rotation rate seems to be a 7.6 arc minute and the "optimum" stroke width seems to be 40 rpm for a Dyop 20/20 acuity endpoint.  The "optimum" Dyop stimulus area equivalent to a Snellen 20/20, or Metric 6/6, acuity and refraction endpoint is 0.54 arc minutes squared, or the equivalent of about 20 photoreceptors.

 

That "optimum" 0.54 arc minute squared stimulus area at a 40 rpm rotation speed creates a photoreceptor refresh rate (much like the shutter speed of a camera) of 0.33 arc minutes squared per second.

 

Dyop Concept of Accommodation

Dyop vs. Snellen Comparison

 

A comparison of the Dyop test vs. the Snellen/Sloan/Landolt tests leads to the following conclusions as to the numerous flaws inherent in Snellen-type letter-based vision testing.

​​1.  The stimulus perceived by the retina is an AREA rather than a one dimensional value of height as defined by Snellen.
2.  Letter-based optotypes are inherently inconsistent due to the inconsistency of their visual stimulus AREAS (the white gaps). 
3.  The Dyop (empirically determined) stimulus AREA is 0.54 arc minutes squared.  Conventional Snellen/Sloan/Landolt (1862 static-letter-based) tests have a defined theoretical stimulus AREA of 1.0 arc minute squared,.  That almost two-fold excess in the size of the Snellen stimulus AREA is the reason for "standard" static-letter-based tests having a logarithmic increase in size or viewing distance with a linear increase in diopters of blur.  The Dyop has a linear diameter increase with an increase in blur and/or viewing distance.
4.  Acuity and cognition are separate components of vision.  The “pure” physiological visual response to the Dyop test eliminates the cultural bias of European letters as well as increases the consistency and universality of the Dyop response.
5.  Motion detection is an inherent facet of acuity.  It can be used in infants and non-literate adults to determine the acuity endpoint as the smallest stimulus where that motion is still detected.  The actual 0.54 arc minute squared MAR stimulates only about 20 photoreceptors, so that about five clusters (100 photoreceptors) need to be stimulated to generate the response of one optic nerve fiber.
6.  “Identically sized” letter-based static optotypes do not have an identical visual response.  Individuals habituated to the hyper-crispness of electronic images, due to the Stiles-Crawford effect, tend to respond differently to fuzzy optotypes in wanting to maximize the black/white contrast by increasing the visual power. 
7.  The response of cone photoreceptors is a transient bioelectrical stimulus from specific wavelengths of light.  Refreshing that photoreceptor transient response is a promoted by the saccade process.  As a result, static image optotype fixation extinguishes the normal photoreceptor refresh rate (calculated to be 0.33 arc minutes squared per second) leading to visual stress, reduced acuity, and an overminused refraction.
8.  Accommodation is a learned response based on the focal depth of red and green in relation to the retina.  This is reflected in the disparity and variances in color acuity with the Dyop test which validates that accommodation is a color perception function.
9.  Not all trichromats have the same ratio of red/green photoreceptors.  Variations in trichromat response are associated with chromatin-associated maladies such as dyslexia, migraines, and epilepsy.
10.  Variances in color acuity are genetic in origin and have a cultural/psychological effect on an individual.  The stresses of near vision contribute to individuals with high-red photoreceptor ratios having a tendency for chromatic stress related maladies, and a psychological preference toward a more structured (authoritarian) environment.

 

 



The Dyop® (Dynamic Optotype™) tests and concept are covered under U.S. Patent US 8,083,353

and International Published Patent WO 2011/022428.

For further information contact: Allan Hytowitz at Allan@Dyop.org

5035 Morton Ferry Circle, Johns Creek, GA, 30022   /   404-281-7798

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