By Amanda Dankberg (Class of 2025)
Our brain is the most important organ in our body. it controls our thoughts, our emotions, our movements. Yet, we know the least about it. Research has been extensive in this field, with new discoveries being made everyday. One of our professors right here at UCLA, Katsushi Arisaka, is a leading researcher in the field with a background in physics. However, it is his background in quantum physics research that led to his new discoveries concerning the brain, and, specifically, vision.
Just this month, the Arisaka lab released a study that denies the widespread theory of how we see— even directly contradicting modern neuroscience textbooks. The current belief is that we see first a small detail of an object which then expands into a bigger picture as we broaden our attention which we then recognize as the object. This led to the binding problem— neuroscientists could not explain how the brain segregates elements into complex patterns of sensory input leading to the allocation of said object. The reason neuroscientists could not figure this out is that their concept was completely wrong in the first place.
It was found that our vision actually works from the top-down rather than bottom-up as previously believed (the bottom being the part of the brain that processes visual input and the top being the brain's predictive abilities) (Eagleman 2017). This essentially means that rather than using sensory input to recognize an object later with our memory of it, we actually use our memory first. We predict what we will see and then compare the object to our memory using the sensory input from our eyes. Only about 10% of object recognition (in terms of neuron activity) comes from our vision! Once we vaguely recognize what an object is, we then go deeper into the small details and notice the differences from our memory. This also explains how we can recognize things when they are at a different orientation or distance. If the original theory were true, we would have to memorize an infinite amount of variations of said object, at every possible orientation and distance.
It was also recently discovered that vision is a function of time. This explains how we know where objects are and how we can then navigate through space (Llinas, 2008). Our eyes are constantly making small, rapid movements called saccades which we are not conscious of. Basically, as our eyes dart about, we measure the time it takes for us to change focus from one component of a scene to the next and we can then tell the distance between them, creating the allocentric frame which informs our knowledge of where things are in relation to each other. This is why when we stare, things start to get blurry as we can no longer tell the distance between things as precisely.
These distances are measured in vectors with a cartesian coordinate system (this is where the physics comes in!) using the NHT which stands for neural holographic tomography, a system which assigns 3D coordinates to the space and converts them into vectors that our brain then converts into a log-polar coordinate system using trigonometric functions (sin and cos). This constitutes the HAL, a holographic ring attractor lattice discovered by the Arisaka lab, which is then used to compare a visual stimulus to our prediction (Arisaka 2022).
The HAL uses 3D rotation invariance (yaw, pitch, and roll) to compare an object to our memory of it. After seeing the object, your brain rotates it until it is the correct orientation of your memory. When things are far away, it will shift in the degrees of the log polar coordinate system and your brain can then recognize its distance. When something is in your peripheral vision, your brain will bring it into the center to compare it to your memory. Arisaka and his research team of undergraduate students have done tests comparing the distance or orientation of a visual stimulus to reaction times. Longer reaction times were correlated to stimuli that were further away, in the peripheral vision, or at a different orientation. This is because it takes slightly longer for the brain to bring it to the center and compare— also supporting the notion that vision is a function of time.
Many individuals in our society suffer from disorders of the brain and the eyes. As we make progress in studying and understanding our brain, we are getting closer to treating these ailments. For example, the top-down theory gave rise to an experiment in which blind people could “see” using stimuli that came from elsewhere besides their non-functioning eyes, in this case small electric charges centered on their back (Eagleman, 2017). This new approach of coupling physics with neuroscience leads to a better understanding of how our brain works which could save lives in the future. Arisaka’s new findings show how we navigate through space using our senses and our brain’s predictive abilities as a function of time. With this research, he and his team have constructed a completed map of the brain and the order of each process. This could help pinpoint why people suffer with the loss of their senses and how we can potentially treat them.
References:
Arisaka, K. (2022). Grand Unified Theory of Mind and Brain, 1. https://www.elegantmind.org/uploads/2/8/1/6/28166963/arisaka_gut-2_nht_and_hal_2-27-2022_v1.pdf
Eagleman, D. (2017). The brain: The story of you. Vintage Books.
Llinás Rodolfo Riascos. (2008). I of the vortex: From neurons to self. MIT Press.
Just this month, the Arisaka lab released a study that denies the widespread theory of how we see— even directly contradicting modern neuroscience textbooks. The current belief is that we see first a small detail of an object which then expands into a bigger picture as we broaden our attention which we then recognize as the object. This led to the binding problem— neuroscientists could not explain how the brain segregates elements into complex patterns of sensory input leading to the allocation of said object. The reason neuroscientists could not figure this out is that their concept was completely wrong in the first place.
It was found that our vision actually works from the top-down rather than bottom-up as previously believed (the bottom being the part of the brain that processes visual input and the top being the brain's predictive abilities) (Eagleman 2017). This essentially means that rather than using sensory input to recognize an object later with our memory of it, we actually use our memory first. We predict what we will see and then compare the object to our memory using the sensory input from our eyes. Only about 10% of object recognition (in terms of neuron activity) comes from our vision! Once we vaguely recognize what an object is, we then go deeper into the small details and notice the differences from our memory. This also explains how we can recognize things when they are at a different orientation or distance. If the original theory were true, we would have to memorize an infinite amount of variations of said object, at every possible orientation and distance.
It was also recently discovered that vision is a function of time. This explains how we know where objects are and how we can then navigate through space (Llinas, 2008). Our eyes are constantly making small, rapid movements called saccades which we are not conscious of. Basically, as our eyes dart about, we measure the time it takes for us to change focus from one component of a scene to the next and we can then tell the distance between them, creating the allocentric frame which informs our knowledge of where things are in relation to each other. This is why when we stare, things start to get blurry as we can no longer tell the distance between things as precisely.
These distances are measured in vectors with a cartesian coordinate system (this is where the physics comes in!) using the NHT which stands for neural holographic tomography, a system which assigns 3D coordinates to the space and converts them into vectors that our brain then converts into a log-polar coordinate system using trigonometric functions (sin and cos). This constitutes the HAL, a holographic ring attractor lattice discovered by the Arisaka lab, which is then used to compare a visual stimulus to our prediction (Arisaka 2022).
The HAL uses 3D rotation invariance (yaw, pitch, and roll) to compare an object to our memory of it. After seeing the object, your brain rotates it until it is the correct orientation of your memory. When things are far away, it will shift in the degrees of the log polar coordinate system and your brain can then recognize its distance. When something is in your peripheral vision, your brain will bring it into the center to compare it to your memory. Arisaka and his research team of undergraduate students have done tests comparing the distance or orientation of a visual stimulus to reaction times. Longer reaction times were correlated to stimuli that were further away, in the peripheral vision, or at a different orientation. This is because it takes slightly longer for the brain to bring it to the center and compare— also supporting the notion that vision is a function of time.
Many individuals in our society suffer from disorders of the brain and the eyes. As we make progress in studying and understanding our brain, we are getting closer to treating these ailments. For example, the top-down theory gave rise to an experiment in which blind people could “see” using stimuli that came from elsewhere besides their non-functioning eyes, in this case small electric charges centered on their back (Eagleman, 2017). This new approach of coupling physics with neuroscience leads to a better understanding of how our brain works which could save lives in the future. Arisaka’s new findings show how we navigate through space using our senses and our brain’s predictive abilities as a function of time. With this research, he and his team have constructed a completed map of the brain and the order of each process. This could help pinpoint why people suffer with the loss of their senses and how we can potentially treat them.
References:
Arisaka, K. (2022). Grand Unified Theory of Mind and Brain, 1. https://www.elegantmind.org/uploads/2/8/1/6/28166963/arisaka_gut-2_nht_and_hal_2-27-2022_v1.pdf
Eagleman, D. (2017). The brain: The story of you. Vintage Books.
Llinás Rodolfo Riascos. (2008). I of the vortex: From neurons to self. MIT Press.
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