Biology is designed for multi-semester biology courses for science majors. It is grounded on an evolutionary basis and includes exciting features that highlight careers in the biological sciences and everyday applications of the concepts at hand. To meet the needs of today’s instructors and students, some content has been strategically condensed while maintaining the overall scope and coverage of traditional texts for this course. Instructors can customize the book, adapting it to the approach that works best in their classroom. Biology also includes an innovative art program that incorporates critical thinking and clicker questions to help students understand—and apply—key concepts.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:Explain how electromagnetic waves differs from sound wavesTrace the path of light through the eye to the point of the optic nerveExplain tonic activity as it is manifested in photoreceptors in the retina

Students examine the structure and function of the human eye, learning some amazing features about our eyes, which provide us with sight and an understanding of our surroundings. Students also learn about some common eye problems and the biomedical devices and medical procedures that resolve or help to lessen the effects of these vision deficiencies, including vision correction surgery.

Stare at one color—but see another. You see color when receptor cells (called cones) in your eye’s retina are stimulated by light. There are three types of cones, and each is sensitive to a particular color range. If one or more of the three types of cones adapts to a stimulus because of long exposure, it responds less strongly than it normally would.

The eye’s retina receives and reacts to incoming light and sends signals to the brain, allowing you to see. One part of the retina, however, doesn't give you visual information—this is your eye’s “blind spot.”

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Wet age-related macular degeneration, or wet AMD, occurs when newly formed blood vessels leak or bleed into the center of the retina, resulting in poor vision. Proactive treatment with intravitreal aflibercept has produced good outcomes in clinical studies. The treat-and-extend dosing strategy in particular has been shown to produce similar visual outcomes to fixed dosing every 4 or 8 weeks. And real-world evidence suggests that patients treated proactively in real life show outcomes similar to those observed in clinical trials. In the ALTAIR study, investigators explored how to fine-tune the proactive treat-and-extend approach in Japanese patients. The study aimed to identify the optimal extension interval for individual patients and individualize treatment with optimal extension to reduce the treatment burden for as many patients as possible. Ideally, treatments would be as infrequent as once every 16 weeks—with fast extensions made in 4-week increments—while maintaining initial vision gains..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This patient education program discusses age-related macular degeneration including the causes, risks, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment options, and management of the disease. It also reviews the anatomy of the eye and vision. This resource is a MedlinePlus Interactive Health Tutorial from the National Library of Medicine, designed and developed by the Patient Education Institute.

This lesson describes the function and components of the human nervous system. It helps students understand the purpose of our brain, spinal cord, nerves and the five senses. How the nervous system is affected during spaceflight is also discussed in this lesson.

Vision is the primary sense of many animals and much is known about how vision is processed in the mammalian nervous system. One distinct property of the primary visual cortex is a highly organized pattern of sensitivity to location and orientation of objects in the visual field. But how did we learn this? An important tool is the ability to design experiments to map out the structure and response of a system such as vision. In this activity, students learn about the visual system and then conduct a model experiment to map the visual field response of a Panoptes robot. (In Greek mythology, Argus Panoptes was the "all-seeing" watchman giant with 100 eyes.) A simple activity modification enables a true black box experiment, in which students do not directly observe how the visual system is configured, and must match the input to the output in order to reconstruct the unseen system inside the box.

Psychology is designed to meet scope and sequence requirements for the single-semester introduction to psychology course. The book offers a comprehensive treatment of core concepts, grounded in both classic studies and current and emerging research. The text also includes coverage of the DSM-5 in examinations of psychological disorders. Psychology incorporates discussions that reflect the diversity within the discipline, as well as the diversity of cultures and communities across the globe.Senior Contributing AuthorsRose M. Spielman, Formerly of Quinnipiac UniversityContributing AuthorsKathryn Dumper, Bainbridge State CollegeWilliam Jenkins, Mercer UniversityArlene Lacombe, Saint Joseph's UniversityMarilyn Lovett, Livingstone CollegeMarion Perlmutter, University of Michigan

By the end of this section, you will be able to:Describe the basic anatomy of the visual systemDiscuss how rods and cones contribute to different aspects of visionDescribe how monocular and binocular cues are used in the perception of depth

In this quick optics activity, learners use a dim point of light (a disassembled Mini MagLite and dowel set-up) to cast a shadow of the blood supply in their retina onto the retina itself. This allows learners to see the blood supply of their retina and even their blind spot. Learners are encouraged to wear eye protection.

This course examines the neural bases of sensory perception. The focus is on physiological and anatomical studies of the mammalian nervous system as well as behavioral studies of animals and humans. Topics include visual pattern, color and depth perception, auditory responses and sound localization, and somatosensory perception.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Retinal degeneration diseases affect over 200 million people worldwide These diseases cause severe vision loss and can ultimately lead to irreversible blindness While excessive light exposure is known to damage photoreceptors and exacerbate retinal degeneration, the underlying mechanism is unclear, making it difficult to effectively treat these diseases In a recent study, researchers sought to understand the mechanisms driving light-induced photoreceptor cell death Using mouse models, they evaluated the molecular changes that occurred in retinal cells after excessive light exposure The results showed that light activated the molecules mTOR and PARP-1, initiating a unique programmed cell death mechanism termed “parthanatos” Blocking this process protected light-damaged photoreceptors, preventing cell death While additional studies are needed to determine the precise mechanisms involved and how these results translate to humans, the results suggest that targeting mTOR and PARP-1 could lead to strateg.."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Age brings with it many chronic conditions related to tissue decline and inflammation. The functions of our intestinal barrier, brain, and eyes can all be affected by changes in our gut microbiota which occur with ageing. However, we don’t yet know if age-related changes to the microbiome cause any of the observed changes in other tissues. To close this gap, researchers used fecal microbiota transfer (FMT) between mice of different ages. They found that transfer of gut microbiota from aged donor mice to young mice induced inflammation in the gut, brain and retina. Intestinal permeability was increased, and the brain showed microglial activation in these aged-to-young FMT recipients. The retinas of recipients also showed altered cytokine signalling and loss of a key protein important for normal vision, thus identifying a role for gut microbiota in regulating eye health..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.