O sistema visual humano é capaz de perceber diretamente fenômenos quânticos? Podemos captar propriedades especiais da luz associadas à sua natureza quântica? Se sim, essa percepção influencia nosso comportamento? Manifesta-se de forma consciente?
These are some of the central questions of this innovative research in neurophysics, which aims to investigate the limits of the interaction between physics and neuroscience. Since it began in 2021, the project has brought together a multidisciplinary team of researchers from physics, mathematics, computer science, and neuroscience, fostering an integrated approach to investigate such phenomena.
The group has made progress on experimental setups, quantum measurements, and data integration with psychophysical response studies. Activities run in parallel at four hubs: IDOR (RJ and SP), UFRJ, and UFMG — a collaborative structure that strengthens research consolidation at the national level.
The Neurophysics project aims to investigate, with unprecedented precision, the fundamental mechanisms of spatial and temporal integration in the human visual system in the few-photon regime.
It is a line of research at the interface between psychophysics, sensory neuroscience, and quantum optics, focused on understanding how the human visual system processes light stimuli under extreme conditions, close to the absolute threshold of vision.
Since the 19th century, the classical laws of psychophysics have described the temporal and spatial summation of the light perceived by an observer. However, the precise way in which the visual system integrates individual photons over time and space remains an open question.
Recent advances in directional light sources and high-precision spatial and temporal modulation systems now allow us to revisit these laws under tighter control of luminance, spectrum, and the temporal and spatial distribution of the light stimulus. This is what our multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary project proposes.
