Human Vertical Eye Movement Responses to Earth Horizontal Pitch

Abstract

The vertical eye movements in humans produced in response to head-over-heels constant velocity pitch rotation about a horizontal axis resemble those from other species. At 60°/s these are persistent and tend to have non-reversing slow components that are compensatory to the direction of rotation. In most, but not all subjects, the slow component velocity was well characterized by a rapid build-up followed by an exponential decay to a non-zero baseline. Super-imposed was a cyclic or modulation component whose frequency corresponded to the time for one revolution and whose maximum amplitude occurred during a specific head orientation. All response components (exponential decay, baseline and modulation) were larger during pitch backward compared to pitch forward runs. Decay time constants were shorter during the backward runs, thus, unlike left to right yaw axis rotation, pitch responses display significant asymmetries between paired forward and backward runs.

Key Words:

• vestibulo-ocular reflex
• otolithic organs
• scleral search coils
• off vertical axis rotation