A spectral theory of color perception

Vibrational Detection of Odorant Functional Groups by Drosophila melanogaster

A remarkable feature of olfaction, and perhaps the hardest one to explain by shape-based molecular recognition, is the ability to detect the presence of functional groups in odorants, irrespective of molecular context. We previously showed that Drosophila trained to avoid deuterated odorants could respond to a molecule bearing a nitrile group, which shares the vibrational stretch frequency with the CD bond. Here, we reproduce and extend this finding by showing analogous olfactory responses of Drosophila to the chemically vastly different functional groups, thiols and boranes, that nevertheless possess a common vibration at 2600 cm⁻¹. Furthermore, we show that Drosophila do not respond to a cyanohydrin structure that renders nitrile groups invisible to IR spectroscopy. We argue that the response of Drosophila to these odorants which parallels their perception in humans, supports the hypothesis that odor character is encoded in odorant molecular vibrations, not in the specific shape-based activation pattern of receptors.

Derivation of Human Chromatic Discrimination Ability from an Information-Theoretical Notion of Distance in Color Space

The accuracy with which humans detect chromatic differences varies throughout color space. For example, we are far more precise when discriminating two similar orange stimuli than two similar green stimuli. In order for two colors to be perceived as different, the neurons representing chromatic information must respond differently, and the difference must be larger than the trial-to-trial variability of the response to each separate color. Photoreceptors constitute the first stage in the processing of color information; many more stages are required before humans can consciously report whether two stimuli are perceived as chromatically distinguishable. Therefore, although photoreceptor absorption curves are expected to influence the accuracy of conscious discriminability, there is no reason to believe that they should suffice to explain it. Here we develop information-theoretical tools based on the Fisher metric that demonstrate that photoreceptor absorption properties explain about 87% of the variance of human color discrimination ability, as tested by previous behavioral experiments. In the context of this theory, the bottleneck in chromatic information processing is determined by photoreceptor absorption characteristics. Subsequent encoding stages modify only marginally the chromatic discriminability at the photoreceptor level.

Entropy, color, and color rendering

The Shannon entropy [Bell Syst. Tech J.27, 379 (1948)] of spectral distributions is applied to the problem of color rendering. With this novel approach, calculations for visual white entropy, spectral entropy, and color rendering are proposed, indices that are unreliant on the subjectivity inherent in reference spectra and color samples. The indices are tested against real lamp spectra, showing a simple and robust system for color rendering assessment. The discussion considers potential roles for white entropy in several areas of color theory and psychophysics and nonextensive entropy generalizations of the entropy indices in mathematical color spaces.

Predicting frequency of metamerism in natural scenes by entropy of colors

Estimating the frequency of metameric surfaces in natural scenes usually requires many comparisons of surface colors to determine which are visually indistinguishable under one light but distinguishable-by a certain criterion degree-under another. The aim here was to test the predictive power of a simpler approach to estimation based on the entropy of colors. In simulations with 50 hyperspectral images of natural scenes, the logarithm of the observed relative frequency of metamerism in each scene under two successive daylights was regressed on combinations of the estimated Shannon differential entropies of the colors of the scene under the same two daylights. The regression was strong, and it remained so when restricted to the estimated differential entropy under just the first daylight, providing that the criterion degree of metamerism was limited. When the criterion degree was made more extreme, however, the restricted regression failed. A possible explanation of the predictive power of differential entropy is briefly considered.

Spectral color constancy using a maximum entropy approach

This paper proposes a solution to the spectral color constancy problem. The method is based on a statistical model for the surface reflectance spectrum and applies a maximum entropy constraint. Unlike prior methods based on linear models, the solution process does not require a set of basis functions to be defined, nor does it require a database of spectra to be specified in advance. Experiments on simulated and real data show that spectral estimation using the maximum entropy approach is feasible and performs similarly to existing spectral methods in spite of the lower level of a priori information required.