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Human Eye and colourful world

The human eye is the organ that gives us the sense of sight, and thus allows us to observe and learn more about this colourful
world than we do with any of the other four sense organs. Human eyes helps us to see this colorful world. Eye enables us to see
by stimulating the creation of images in our brain. The eyes gather light from whatever we are looking at. Reflex mechanisms
control the amount of light entering the eye, and enable the eye to focus on objects whether they are near or distant.

The main components of the eye :
Eyelid: It protects the delicate outer surface of the eye.
Eyeball: Eyeball is a sphere measuring 6.25 cm (2.5 inches) in diameter. Eyeballs contain sensory cells that when
stimulated by light, send messages to the brain that are interpreted as images. Major part of the eye is protected within
an orbit, a bony socket in the skull.
Cornea; It is the outermost layer of the eye through which the light passes. It does not contain any blood vessels but
contain Sclera; It is made up of white non transparent tissue surrounding the cornea at the outer surface of the eye. It
is fibrous, p rotective outer layer of the eye made of collagen and
elastic fiber and the muscles that control the eye movement are connected to it.
Iris: The main purpose of iris is to control the amount of light that enters the eye. When the amount of light entering is
more the iris diaphragm contracts which causes less light to enter the eye and prevent damaging the light receptors and
thus avoid blindness and when the light is very less the iris relaxes and the pupil become larger and their function are as
follows :so that more light enters the eye.
Pupil: The pupil is located at the center of the iris of the eye which allows light to enter the retina. It is empty space
through which light enters. Pupil is black since most of the light entering the pupil is absorbed by the tissues inside the
eye .
Aqueous Humor: It is the clear liquid that lies between cornea and the lens. It is alkaline and made mostly of water. It
supplies nutrients to the eyes. It is continuously secreted and absorbed at the constant rate of one teaspoon per day .The
liquid after passing through the drains out of the eye into the bloodstream.
Vitreous Humour: The space between eye lens and retina is filled with a jelly like transparent fluid called vitreous
humour
Choroid: It is a vascular layer containing connective tissue having thickness of 0.5. It provides nourishment and oxygen
to the outer layer of the retina.
Ciliary muscles: These are the ring of muscles which are smooth that are responsible for changing the shape of the lens.
When these ciliary muscles are relaxed the lens are stretched, enabling it focus on the distant objects. When these
ciliary muscles are contracted the lens become rounder, enabling it focus on the nearby objects.
Retina: It is one of the most important part without which we cannot view image. The retina is the light sensitive tissue
lining the inner surface of eye. It senses light and creates impulses that are sent through optic nerve to brain which
converts light energy to electrical. Receptor cells are present in retinas which are light sensitive. In retina there are two
types of receptor cells are present: rods and cones. Rods function in dim light and provide black and white vision while
cones provide perception of color at daytime. There are approximately 100 million rods and 6 million cones in one eye.
. The retina is a thin tissue that has many layers nerve cells that are sensitive to the brightness as well as to the colors of
light. The nerve cells carry the message about the image from the retina to the brain in the form of special signals. The
brain them interprets these signals we like at.
Lens:It is transparent and focus light on to the retina. By changing its shape it focuses on object at various distances. It
is biconvex, curved on both sides and attached to ciliary muscles which change the shape of lens. The ciliary muscles

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contract or tighten up as a result the eye lens becomes thicker or thinner. This enables eyes to form image on the retina
of the objects close to us.
Rods and cones : are the photoreceptor cells for vision and are situated in the retina of human eye.The outer ends of both
rods and the cones are in contact with the pigment layer of retina of human eye and the inner ends are directed towards
the centre of the human eye. The rod shaped cells of our retina respond to the intensity of light . In other words, the rod
shaped cells respond to the brightness of the light. The cone shaped cells make us see colors and make us distinguish
between various colors. Thus cones make color perception possible.
Optic Nerve: Optic nerve carries the information to brain.

Blind Spot : The region of eye containing the optic nerve is not at all sensitive to light and is called blind spot. If the
image of an object is formed in the blind spot, it is not visible.
Yellow Spot : The central part of retina lying on the optic axis of eye is most sensitive to light and is called yellow spot.
Working of Human Eye:
Light waves from an item enter the eye first through the cornea, which is the clear dome at the face of the
eye. The light then progresses through the pupil, which is the spherical opening in the center of the colored iris.
Fluctuations in incoming light change the amount of the light entering the pupil. When the light entering the eye is
adequately intense, the pupil will get smaller. The light waves are bent first by the cornea, and then added by the
crystalline lens located immediately behind the iris and the pupil to a nodal point located immediately behind the back
surface of the lens. Within the layers of the retina, light impulses are changed into the electrical signals. Then they are
sent throughout the optic nerve along the visual pathway, to the occipital cortex at the posterior of the brain. Here, the
brain interprets the electrical signals as a visual image.
There are certain people who are said to be "colour blind". The reason is that they can't differentiate between
colours. This happens as they don't have cone shaped cells that respond to certain specific colour only.
Defects in human eye:
1. cataract: The clouding of eye lens is called cataract.
2. Colorblindness: Patient is not able to differentiate between different colours, as they dont have cone shaped shells that
respond to specify colours.
3. Night blindness: Caused due to lack of rod cells.
4. Myopia or shortsightedness : Inability of the eye in viewing long distance objects. The image in this case falls before
retina. There is a far point beyond which clear image cannot be seen.
Cause: i)Excessive curvature in cornea ii) Elongation of eye-ball
Correction: Use of concave lens which diverge and shift the image to retina.
5. Hypermetropia or long-sightedness: Inability of the eye in viewing long distance objects. Image in this case is formed
beyond the retina. For hypermetropic eye there is a near point.
Causes: i)Greater focal length of the lens ii) Eye ball become smaller
Correction: Use of convex lens which converges and shift the image to retina.
Quick checkouts:
1. First refraction of light occurs at: 5. Give the description of image formed at retina:
2. Night blindness is caused due to lack of: 6. Correction of myopia and hypermetropia is done by:
3. Colour blindness is caused due to lack of: 7. Size of human eye is approximately:
4. Image is formed at: 8. Dilation of eye is done by: