The contrast sensitivity of the cat

1. The experiments were carried out on pretrigeminal cats. 2. By recording potentials evoked from the visual cortex by a grating stimulus, it was established that there was a linear relation between the voltage generated and the logarithm of the contrast of the grating. 3. The voltage evoked by the grating was independent of the orientation of the grating. 4. It has previously been shown in man that, if the contrast is determined by an extrapolation to the point at which a zero voltage occurs, this value corresponds to the psychophysical threshold. On the assumption that the threshold of the cat also occurs at zero voltage, thresholds for a number of spatial frequencies and orientations were determined. 5. When the threshold sensitivity function for the cat is compared with man it is found to be displaced to lower spatial frequencies by a factor of about ten. This means that while the cat cannot see such high spatial frequencies as man, it can see lower frequencies better than man. © 1973 The Physiological Society