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10 Jul 2002
Three-hundred million Europeans now have an easy way to check whether or not they suffer from red-green color blindness.
Spanish researchers are suggesting that the new Euro coins, introduced in January of this year across most of Europe, could be used as an instant test for red-green color blindness. Thanks to the properties of two Euro coins, Maria Isabel Suero and co-workers at the University of Extremadura, Badajoz, Spain, say defects in color vision can be detected both quickly and cheaply. (Optics Express 10 527)
Color blindness sufferers confuse reds, yellows and greens. Traditional tests to detect deficiency in color vision are difficult to evaluate or calibrate. But in trials comparing 5 cent coins, which have a reddish tone, with 10 and 20 cent coins, which have a yellowish tone, color-blind observers were incapable of separating them while normal observers achieved the operation in seconds.
A colorimetric analysis of these coins, using a GretagMacbeth Spectrolino spectrophotometer, highlights the hidden similarities of the coins. The chromaticity coordinates lie on what are known as confusion lines, which join points on the chromaticity diagram that appear the same for the two main types of red-green color-blind people.
So that the observers could not identify the coins by value, the obverse side was used with designs from countries unknown to the observers.
Suero says that the research project is continuing and hopes that medical authorities will be able to pick up on the method.
She adds: "About the euro design, it is clear that color vision deficient people have not been taken into account."
Author
Phillip Hill is editor of Displays Europe magazine.
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