Human Eye

SSC MTS Exam
S t u d y M a t e r i a l f o r Genral Awareness
HUMAN EYE
● Human eye is one of the most valuable and sensitive sense organs.
● Light enters the eye through a thin membrane called the cornea.
● Retina is lens system forms an image on a light-sensitive screen.
● The human eye forms the image of an object at its retina.
● Iris is colored part of the eye. It may be blue, brown or green in colour. Every person has a
unique colour, pattern and texture. It holds the pupil and also adjust the size of pupil
according to the intensity of light.
● Pupil is black in color and absorbs all the light rays falling on it. It gets constricted when the
intensity of light is high. It gets expanded when the intensity of light is low.
● Pupil is the centre part of the Iris. It is the pathway for the light to retina.
● Ciliary muscles hold the lens. They adjust the focal length of the lens.
● Eye Lens is the important part of human eye. It is convex in nature.
● The ability of the eye to focus on both near and distant objects by adjusting its focal length is
called the accommodation of the eye.
● The eye lens forms an inverted real image of the object on the retina. The retina is a delicate
membrane having enormous number of light-sensitive cells. The light-sensitive cells get
activated upon illumination and generate electrical signals. These signals are sent to the
brain via the optic nerves.
● The smallest distance at which the eye can see objects clearly without strain is called the
near point of the eye or the least distance of distinct vision. For a young adult with normal
vision, it is about 25 cm.
● The farthest point up to which the eye can see objects clearly is called the far point of the
eye. It is infinity for a normal eye.
Defects Of Vision and Their Correction
● A normal human eye can clearly see all the objects placed between 25 cm and infinity. But,
for some people, the eye loses its power of accommodation. This could happen due to many
reasons including ageing. Hence, their vision becomes defective.
● There are mainly three common refractive defects of vision:
o Myopia or near-sightedness
o Hypermetropia or farsightedness,
o Presbyopia
Myopia
● Myopia is also known as near-sightedness.
● A person with myopia can see nearby objects clearly but cannot see distant objects
distinctly.
● The focal length of eye lens is reduced or the distance between eye lens and retina
increases.
● In a myopic eye the image of a distant object is formed in front of the retina.
● A concave lens of suitable power will bring the image back on to the retina and thus the
defect is corrected.
Hypermetropia
● Hypermetropia is also known as far-sightedness.
● A person with hypermetropia can see distant objects clearly but cannot see nearby objects
distinctly.
● The focal length of eye lens is increased or the distance between eye lens and retina
decreases. Hence, the near point will not be at 25 cm for such eyes and the near point has
moved farther. Due to this, the image of nearby objects is formed behind the retina.
● In a hypermetropia eye the image of a close by object are focused at a point behind the
retina.
● This defect can be corrected by using a convex lens of appropriate power.
Presbyopia
● The power of accommodation of the eye usually decreases with ageing.
● It arises due to the gradual weakening of the ciliary muscles and diminishing flexibility of
the eye lens.
● This defect can be corrected by using a bi-focal lenses.
● A common type of bi-focal lenses consists of both concave and convex lenses. The upper
portion consists of a concave lens. It facilitates distant vision. The lower part is a convex lens.
It facilitates near vision.
Astigmatism
● In this defect, eye cannot see parallel and horizontal lines clearly. It may be inherited or
acquired.
● It is due to the imperfect structure of eye lens because of the development of cataract on
the lens, ulceration of cornea, injury to the refracting surfaces, etc.
● Astigmatism can be corrected by using cylindrical lenses.
Dispersion Of White Light by a Glass Prism

● The angle between its two lateral faces is called the angle of the prism.
● The prism has probably split the incident white light into a band of colours.
● The various colours seen are Violet, Indigo, Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange and Red.
● The band of the coloured components of a light beam is called its spectrum.
● The splitting of light into its component colours is called dispersion.
● Isaac Newton was the first to use a glass prism to obtain the spectrum of sunlight.
● Different colours of light bend through different angles with respect to the incident ray, as
they pass through a prism. The red light bends the least while the violet the most.
● Red light has the longest wavelength because red refract least, while violet has the
shortest because violet refract most.
● A rainbow is scattering of light a natural spectrum appearing in the sky after a rain shower.
It is caused by dispersion of sunlight by tiny water droplets, present in the atmosphere. A
rainbow is always formed in a direction opposite to that of the Sun. The water droplets act
like small prisms. They refract and disperse the incident sunlight, then reflect it internally,
and finally refract it again when it comes out of the raindrop. Due to the dispersion of light
and internal reflection, different colours reach the observer’s eye.
Atmospheric Refraction
● The twinkling of a star is due to atmospheric refraction of starlight.
● The starlight on entering the earth’s atmosphere undergoes refraction continuously before it
reaches the earth. The atmospheric refraction occurs in a medium of gradually changing
refractive index.
● The Sun is visible to us about 2 minutes before the actual sunrise and about 2 minutes after
the actual sunset because of atmospheric refraction. The apparent flattening of the Sun’s
disc at sunrise and sunset is also due to the same phenomenon.
Scattering of light
● When a beam of light interacts with a particle of matter it is redirected in many different
directions. This phenomenon is called scattering of light.
● Scattering of light causes the blue colour of sky and the reddening of the Sun at sunrise and
sunset.
Why The Colour of Sky Is Blue

● Molecules of air and other fine particles in the atmosphere have size smaller than the
wavelength of visible light.
● The red light has a wavelength greater than blue light. When sunlight passes through the
atmosphere the fine particles in air scatter the blue colour (shorter wavelengths) more
strongly than red. The scattered blue light enters our eyes.
● If the earth had no atmosphere, there would not have been any scattering. Then, the sky
would have looked dark. The sky appears dark to passengers flying at very high
altitudes, as scattering is not prominent at such heights.
● The red is least scattered by fog or smoke that is the reason danger signal lights are red
in colour.
● At noon the Sun appears white as only a little of the blue and violet colours are
scattered. Near the horizon most of the blue light and shorter wavelengths are scattered
away by the particles. Therefore, the light that reaches our eyes is of longer wavelengths.
This gives rise to the reddish appearance of the Sun.

Human Eye

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SSC MTS Exam

Dispersion Of White Light by a Glass Prism

Why The Colour of Sky Is Blue

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