Science & Technology at Scientific American.com: Owl's Ability to Link Sight and Sound Could Be Key to Treating Attention Disorders

Science & Technology at Scientific American.com: Owl's Ability to Link Sight and Sound Could Be Key to Treating Attention Disorders:

"Owls are already extremely gifted at tuning in a particular sound, the authors note in their paper published in the current issue of Nature, but pairing a sound with a sight enhanced that ability even further. 'The ability to hear and the direction of gaze aren't necessarily linked,' Winkowski says. But 'the circuits in the brain that control gaze direction affect how the brain processes auditory information.'

Similar sound-and-vision circuitry has already been demonstrated in monkeys and humans, but the owls represent the first nonprimates to show this.'The fundamental mechanisms are probably going to be the same in all vertebrates, as even frogs and fish have gaze control,'"