Title :
Pseudo-“Blindsight” Induced by Extremely Low Frequency Electromagnetic Stimulations
Author :
Nakagawa, Hirotoshi ; Ueno, Satoshi
Author_Institution :
Tokyo Denki Univ., Tokyo, Japan
Abstract :
We investigated electromagnetic effects of phosphene as pseudo-blindsight under the influence of background colors. Five healthy male subjects ranging in age from 20 to 65 participated in the visual stimulation experiments. Concerning the frequency response characteristics of phosphene sensitivity at wavelengths 430, 530, and 560 nm (corresponding with short (S), medium (M), and long (L) wave-sensitive cone, respectively) with background light (40 l×), the sensitivities decreased by nearly one and a half times more than in the control experiment, and the threshold of the phosphene at the three wavelengths was ~22 mT on average. Furthermore, we found that electromagnetic fields of up to 40 mT might possibly affect the duration of complementary colors after a 20-s process of the blindsight-like phosphene. Our results demonstrated the possibility that pseudo-blindsight induced by electromagnetic stimulations of 40 mT at 20 Hz specifically affects retinal S-cone input, and this new knowledge may be applied as part of therapeutic eyesight exercises.
Keywords :
biological effects of fields; colour vision; eye; visual evoked potentials; background colors; background light; blindsight-like phosphene; complementary colors; electromagnetic effects; extremely low-frequency electromagnetic stimulations; frequency 20 Hz; frequency response characteristics; long wave-sensitive cone; magnetic flux density 40 mT; medium wave-sensitive cone; phosphene sensitivity; pseudoblindsight; retinal S-cone input; short wave-sensitive cone; therapeutic eyesight exercises; time 20 s; visual stimulation experiments; wavelength 430 nm; wavelength 530 nm; wavelength 560 nm; Coils; Electromagnetics; Ground penetrating radar; Image color analysis; Retina; Sensitivity; Visualization; Blindsight; electromagnetic field; electromagnetic stimulation; extremely low frequency (ELF);
Journal_Title :
Magnetics, IEEE Transactions on
DOI :
10.1109/TMAG.2014.2323358