"Olo" does not exist in nature, nor can it be found among paint cans. But for a very select few, olo can be seen — through the intervention of careful computing and lasers. A team led by vision scientist Austin Roorda and computer scientist Ren Ng at UC Berkeley figured out a method for stimulating only one specific subset of cones of the retina. It's the only way to view this spectacular teal. Creating the color is helping push the boundaries of vision science.Follow Short Wave on Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.More questions about the science behind our everyday lives? Email us at [email protected]. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
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There are all these tips and tricks to help us remember things, but think about it. Would you even want to remember everything?
Ooh, that's tough.
I would say yes. I would want to, yeah.
Absolutely not.
I'm Kate the Chemist. How we remember on Seeking a Scientist from KCUR, part of the NPR Network.
You're listening to Shortwave from NPR. Color is a trick of the light and a creation of our brain.
It's actually very challenging to study color because of the complexity of it and how the perception is so context-dependent.
Austin Rurda is a professor of optometry and vision science at UC Berkeley, and he's likely the first person in the world to ever see a new color, meaning a color that does not exist in nature and was developed entirely in a lab. Austin and his collaborator, computer scientist Ren Ong, call this novel color Olo.
It's blue-green, it's a teal color, but it's just more saturated than any teal you can see in the natural world.
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