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The Telegraph reports on work published in Current Biology (DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2017.03.076) in which researchers
[...] propose that a risk factor for seizures in patients with photosensitive epilepsy is engagement of the circuitry that produces gamma oscillations.
Gamma oscillations are brain waves that oscillate at frequencies in the 30 to 80 Hz range. One researcher told the Telegraph:
Our findings imply that in designing buildings, it may be important to avoid the types of visual patterns that can activate this circuit and cause discomfort, migraines, or seizures [...] Even perfectly healthy people may feel modest discomfort from the images that are most likely to trigger seizures in photosensitive epilepsy.
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(Score: 2) by fishybell on Wednesday May 10 2017, @04:18PM (5 children)
Almost all of the images they put up there — not the out-of-focus fence or the lady's dress — make my brain buzz in an odd way. Admittedly, I am particularly sensitive to flickering lights, etc., but I've noticed this some brain buzz on striped images before. The more vertical, contrasting, and consistent the stripes, the worse the effect; for me at least. The radiator in particular was difficult to look at for more than a few seconds.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday May 10 2017, @06:13PM (4 children)
There's another (perhaps related?) buzzing thing that some people are susceptible called Ocular Migraine [allaboutvision.com] where some people see stripes when none exist. Can cause the image you see to "buzz".
Ocular migraines are painless, temporary visual disturbances that can affect one or both eyes. Though they can be frightening, ocular migraines typically are harmless and self-resolve without medication within 20 to 30 minutes.
Sample Images [google.com].
I occasionally get these as do a couple other programmer types I've worked with. It can come and go in 20 minutes and may not re-occur for weeks or months. But in my case, its almost impossible to read a line of code when happening. Not at all painful. Don't think it has anything to do with coding, just that the other folks I know who have seen this are programmers.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Wednesday May 10 2017, @09:44PM (3 children)
My friend who had migraines used to call those "halos."
Something like this [drstevensoong.com] looks a lot like when you wake up in the middle of a heavy dream and see those flickering patterns briefly before your mind starts waking up.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 11 2017, @03:21AM
Interesting. I have ocular migraines, but I've never had that waking up from a dream.
The examples from you and GP are pretty accurate. Imagine them shimmering and very, very slowly changing shape and creeping across the field of vision. Annoying as hell if I'm working on a programming problem when it happens. Seems to be unresponsive to weed as well. But yeah, absolutely painless.
Sometimes I can go months without one occurring, and sometimes a couple will happen in the same week. I'm not sure, but I think it might be related to my chronically low sodium. Whenever other indications start appearing in my body that my blood sodium level is starting to get too low, it seems like I have ocular migraines more frequently, but the ocular migraines seem otherwise independent from the usual cluster of symptoms that tells me I need to add some salt to my next glass of water.
(Doctor ordered gatorade or similar, but salt in a glass of water is a ton cheaper and seems effective. Correlation is not causation, ymmv, IANAMedicalDoctor etc.)
Since we're talking about stripes, I looked through the examples given and the radiator was the only one I had difficulty looking at. Did not trigger an episode.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Thursday May 11 2017, @07:36AM (1 child)
About the image [drstevensoong.com] you referenced.
Now that you have pointed it out to me, I now have something to query Google with. Images of migraine. Yet I have no correlation to migraine. Google has found scores of similar images on the keyword "images of migraine". Thanks to you, I may yet find out the mystery of these weird apparitions that occur to me occasionally.
I have seen stuff just like that. For years. And when wide awake.
There is nothing else in my field of vision unusual. Last time I saw those ( that same kind of stripe pattern bounded by the crescent shape ) I was outside walking down the street to Del Taco.
It looked almost like some sort of image overlay as I would do in digital image manipulation software.
Almost like a scene right out of Star Trek with a malfunctioning holographic projector.
What I found so unusual is the crescent was static in my field of view, and the jagged lines in it were perfectly straight, but flashing on, off, and moving around in an unpredictable pattern, other than being bounded by the crescent. Black and white, too... exactly like the artwork depicted.
I am very puzzled over it. Why such a complex pattern... of *straight* lines? Precisely bounded by a crescent? This apparition seems too un-natural for me to subconsciously brew up.
Last time I witnessed this, it ran for about 30 minutes, there whether I had my eyes open or closed. Definitely superimposed on the retina or visual cortex somehow, as it did not appear as something in the neighbor's lawn I could approach or possibly try to touch.
I thought this was peculiar to me. Some sort of minor visual-optical malfunction. I never thought I would see a picture of it drawn by someone else.
That artwork depicted exactly the same thing. I have no idea what it is or what causes it. It comes and goes. Mostly not there.
There was no headache or *any* other discomfort present. Just the visual anomaly. I could not detect anything else on me malfunctioning. I was thinking maybe a sun reflection off a passing car had caused it - but for the life of me could not recall such.
I cannot correlate it with any thing I have eaten, nor any state of mind.
Yet I have seen this same anomaly come and go for many years. Seems harmless enough. I figured it much like an itch that has no apparent cause.
I submit this for whoever may be doing any research into it.
Could it have been some sort of "mini-stroke"?
Yet I have not noted any other kind of stroke-like phenomena, nor does it run in the family.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 1) by anubi on Thursday May 11 2017, @11:37AM
Addendum to my above post.
I have spent the last several hours researching this phenomena.
Thanks to the image link posted by Ethanol, I now know what I have been experiencing. It's called an "ocular migraine".
Quite a few other reports on the internet confirm what I have experienced. In several languages, no less.
They note its likely genetic. My mom had migraines. But hers were painful. Mine are not. I just get the light show. I do not know if mom was getting those displays. I thought she had that same kind of head hurting I normally get when I smell too much gasoline or motor oil or hear the horizontal flyback coil of an old TV too long.
But at least I am now at peace with what this is.
Thanks for posting that image, Ethanol! That was the first time I had ever seen an actual image of what I saw.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]