Vision evolves in mid-life

Toronto, May 30: Researchers have found that research in the current view that our vision can mature in the first few years of life is that the human brain's focus-processing center will continue to grow in the late 30s or 40s. For the study, researchers examined post-mortem brain-tissue samples from 30 people ranging in age from 20 days to 80 years. Visual cortex of the brain showed results published in the neuroscience journal until age 36, plus or minus 4.5 years.
The finding was a surprise to the researchers, who had expected to find that the cortex reached its mature stage by 5 to 6 years, consistent with previous results from animal samples and with prevailing scientific and medical belief. "There's a big gap in our understanding of how our brains function," said lead researcher Kathryn Murphy, Professor at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
"Our idea of sensory areas developing in childhood and then being static is part of the challenge. It's not correct," Murphy said. Treatment for conditions such as amblyopia or "lazy eye", for example, have been based on the idea that only children could benefit from corrective therapies, since it was thought that treating young adults would be pointless because they had passed the age when their brains could respond, Murphy said. Although research is separated from the visual cortex, other areas of the brain may be much more plastic than previously thought.