Mondo Knows Facts
Colour vision depends on three types of cone
S, M and L cones peak at different wavelengths and combine to produce every hue The three cone classes are most sensitive to short, medium and long wavelengths, roughly 420, 534 and 564 nanometres. The brain compares their relative signals rather than reading any single channel. Most other mammals have only two cone types, which is why their colour world looks muted. It sits in Mondo's human body collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.
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Facts that can change over time are reviewed and updated. If something here looks wrong, Mondo would rather know than be confidently incorrect.
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More facts like this
Eye muscles are the most active muscles in the human bodySix delicate muscles move each eye over one hundred thousand times dailyThe cornea is one of the few body parts without blood vesselsTransparent eye tissue receives oxygen directly from tears and airThe human retina contains over one hundred million light receptorsRods enable dark peripheral vision while cones register fine detail and colourCiliary muscles alter lens shape instantaneously to focusSmooth muscle accommodation keeps objects clear across varying distancesTwo forward-facing eyes create three-dimensional sightThe brain compares slightly different images from each eye to judge distanceEach eye has a blind spot where nerves exitThe optic disc carries no photoreceptors, so a small patch of vision is blank
🫀 Human Bodyfact 124 of 200
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Tags: colour, cones, vision
Colour vision depends on three types of cone: the short answers
- Where does this come from, and can I check it?
- S, M and L cones peak at different wavelengths and combine to produce every hue. The figure is taken from NIH, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
- Is this really a human body fact?
- Yes. It sits on the Human Body shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
- What else can I read about it?
- The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.