Do you know why our eyesight is sharpest at dawn and dusk?

( Natural News ) If you’ve ever been up at the crack of dawn or still outside when dusk falls, you may have noticed your sight is sharper than usual. A German study says this is because your brain changes the way it interprets visual signals during sunrise and sunset, according to a New Scientist article . Study author Christian Kell explained that our brain is always hard at work in the background. But come dawn or dusk, this continual background activity drops in the visual cortex, the parts of the brain that interpret visual information. Thanks to this reduction in signal-to-background noise ratio, the human visual cortex is able to focus on perceiving poorly-lit surroundings and objects. That’s why we can see better despite the low levels of light during those times. “You are sensitizing your brain. A weak signal coming in will have a higher signal-to-noise ratio,” explained Kell, a neuroscientist at the Goethe University . He and his colleagues determined this through an experiment with 14 men. They asked the participants to spot a faint, flashing orange cross against a pitch black background at different times of the day. They reported that the participants succeeded the most in their task at around 8:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. (Related: Prevent vision loss by protecting your heart with a healthy diet .) Ancient humans needed improved vision during dawn and dusk to avoid predators The Goethe University research team scanned the brains of the participants six times from 8:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.. They found out that the brain shuts down background activity in the visual cortex during 8:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. Get more news like this without being censored : Get the Natural News app for your mobile devices. Enjoy uncensored news, lab test results, videos, […]

Click here to view full article