The Dance of Light and Hue: Professor Anya Hurlbert’s Exploration of Colour Perception
Professor Anya Hurlbert, a distinguished visual neuroscientist at Newcastle University, has dedicated her research to unraveling the intricate ways in which the human brain interprets the world of color and light. Her work delves into the fundamental mechanisms of visual perception, bridging the disciplines of physics, psychology, and neurobiology to understand how we see the hues that enrich our experience.
At the heart of Professor Hurlbert’s research lies the interaction between color and light. Our perception of color isn’t solely determined by the wavelengths of light reflected off an object. Instead, it’s a complex process where the brain constantly works to achieve a degree of color constancy – the ability to perceive the color of an object as relatively stable despite changes in the spectrum of the illuminating light.
Professor Hurlbert’s work has explored the limits of this color constancy. Think about how a white wall can appear to take on different tints under daylight, incandescent light, or the cool glow of LEDs. Her research investigates how our visual system copes with these variations, often subconsciously “discounting” the illumination to arrive at a consistent perception of the object’s surface color.
One fascinating aspect of her research involves how the brain infers the properties of the illuminating light. Our visual system makes assumptions about the likely sources of light we encounter daily, and these “illumination priors” can influence how we perceive color. A notable example of this in the public sphere was the debate surrounding “the dress” – a viral image that caused people to perceive the garment as either blue and black or white and gold. Professor Hurlbert’s insights helped explain this phenomenon by highlighting how different individuals made different unconscious inferences about the lighting conditions of the photograph, leading to vastly different color perceptions.
Beyond the stability of color perception, Professor Hurlbert’s lab also investigates how color interacts with other visual attributes, such as shape and texture, in defining objects. Furthermore, they explore the emotional responses evoked by color and the development of color perception across the lifespan, including in individuals with neurodevelopmental conditions.
To conduct her research, Professor Hurlbert employs a range of sophisticated techniques, including psychophysics (the study of the relationship between physical stimuli and perceptual experience), computational modeling, and neuroimaging. She has also been involved in developing innovative technologies, such as spectrally tunable LED lighting systems, to control and manipulate the light environment in her experiments precisely. These systems have even been used in museum settings to explore how different illuminations affect the perception of artwork.
Professor Hurlbert’s work extends beyond the laboratory, with applications in diverse fields such as medical diagnostics, food quality assessment using hyperspectral imaging, and the study of color in Old Master and contemporary paintings. Her research offers valuable insights into the fundamental mechanisms of human vision and the significant role that the interplay of color and light plays in shaping our experience and interpretation of the world around us.
