You may either find insects to be adorable or scary, but they are fascinating either way!Isn’t it interesting to try to understand how such small creatures work and see? Well, insects aren’t built the same as humans when it comes to vision.The butterfly or grasshopper that you saw the other day in fact has compound eyes. While such eyes do give insects a hard time when trying to see something from a distance, they also help in seeing colors such as blue, violet, green and yellow rather vividly. Additionally, the light receptors that insects have are also largely more powerful than the singular lenses that human beings have in their eyes. Keep reading for some interesting facts about insect eyes!If you enjoy reading this article, why not also check out how do insects breathe and are worms insects here at Kidadl!Types Of Insect EyesHuman beings have a rather simple eye structure when laid in comparison with the eyes that insects and flies have. Humans have a single lens in each eyeball, which focuses the visual information on the retina. This visual information then travels to the brain through optic nerves and only then are we able to tell what is what. Insects, on the other hand, have compound eyes. Well, most insects do.The lens in each human eye is different from flies and their eyes since they have more than just one lens. In fact, flies and their compound eyes are made up of hundreds and thousands of lenses - each of which has the ability to gather visual information. These visual organs have only been found through recent researches. It has only been a couple of decades since scientists realized that bug eyes and animal eyes aren’t the same!A compound eye is one that is formed of many ommatids. Many insects such as houseflies and true flies have thousands of such ommatids in each eye. To understand ommatids, the easiest explanation would be to think of them as pigment cells. These lenses perceive objects and caption any relevant details that may be present. Some human beings have often thought of compound eyes to be weak in comparison with human eyes since these organs cannot focus on an object or a detail on it through adjusting the lens. Unlike human eyes which can focus on objects and differentiate their shape from varying angles and distances, insect eyes lack such features. Since the lenses cannot adjust in order to perceive an object that may be a little far away, insects often have to move closer or further away from an object to understand its features. However, this should not lead you into thinking less of compound eyes. Each ommatid structure is capable of detecting movement, which helps the fly or insect in catching prey. While proximity can be an issue, the fact that each insect eye has multiple lenses eliminates blind spots and increases the visual field.Compound eyes are also extremely good as photoreceptors and can tell between the light and dark rather skillfully. That is to say that insects and flies have better night vision than human beings. Evolution in nature works in such a way that some insect species even have the ability to observe ultraviolet light! As we know, human beings and most animals do not have eyes that can differentiate ultraviolet light.Other kinds of insect eyes can include ocelli and stemmata. Ocelli can be defined as a single ommatid structure instead of numerous ones. This would definitely compromise the vision of the fly or insect. Insects and flies such as dragonflies and mayflies have ocelli. Ocelli is also known as a simple eye since there is just a single visual organ as opposed to many. These simple eyes are useful for detecting changes in light.Stemmata, on the other hand, also referred to as lateral ocelli, is located on either side of an insect’s head. Some insect species also have a combination of both stemmata and compound eyes, which helps the insect in perceiving its environment in a better way. Such eye structure helps the fly or insect in perceiving distance, light, color, and shape.Insect VisionCompound eyes create a vision or picture that can be best defined as a multi-dimensional and multi-angular one. Since the added number of ommatids or lenses increases the visual field, insects are able to perceive all directions. This is also one of the reasons why human beings always struggle to catch a housefly and kill it.When it comes to the reception of light, insect eyes do an excellent job. Their natural receptor can understand the contrast between light and dark quite well and can also help in color discrimination. There are certain theories that suggest that compared to the eyes of animals and human beings, a compound eye can perceive and differentiate between many colors.If you have seen a dragonfly, you must have noticed how this fly has eyes that seem to protrude out of its body ever so slightly. These eyes not only help the fly in catching prey but also act as a pair of sunglasses. Insect eyes have the capacity of protecting the eyes of the tiny creature from direct sunlight.Complexity Of Insect EyesIn nature, an insect would receive optic signals in the form of luminous areas and dark ones. The compound eyes are created in such a way that each part of the mosaic structure that ommatids create perceives a luminous area. When all the signals received by each ommatid come together, a complete picture of the surroundings is formed.One of the most interesting facts is that some insects such as butterflies even have some additional photoreceptors on the rest of their body. Butterflies have photoreceptors on their genitalia!Color Vision In InsectsWe now know that each compound eye is made up of hundreds and even thousands of ommatids, but the layout of these visual structures is also one of the wonders of nature.Each ommatid is placed in such a way that they do not face the same direction at the exact same angle. This helps in making sure that the light perception of one ommatid does not spill over to the light perception of the next one. When it comes to color vision, there are some theories that suggest that some insects cannot differentiate between the different pigments of light as well as animals can. On the other hand, they can very well perceive ultraviolet light.At the same time, it is also interesting to note that some insects are blind to red and orange lights! When colors such as blue, green, or violet are present in the environment, you can be quite sure that butterflies and other insects would be able to see them quite well!Optical Wonders Of Insect EyesThe wonders of insect eyes and their fascinating nature are such that human beings have been researching them for a long time.In fact, there was a rather recent development of such a camera that about the same number of pigment cells or lenses as that of the compound eye of a fire ant. Such a device has been able to throw some light on the nature of insect eyes and the range of their perception!Here at Kidadl, we have carefully created lots of interesting family-friendly facts for everyone to enjoy! If you liked our suggestions for insect eyes then why not take a look at what do insects eat or carpenter ant facts.
You may either find insects to be adorable or scary, but they are fascinating either way!
