A Qualitative Model-Framework for Spatio-temporal Effects in Vertebrate Retinas

Retinal models based on the Cellular Neural Network (CNN) paradigm [2] have been widely used [3-8]. These neuromorphic models are based on retinal anatomy and physiology [1, 10-11]. In this paper a framework is proposed for qualitative spatiotemporal studies in vertebrate retinas. The underlying retinal anatomy is followed as closely as possible, the characteristics of the physiological models, however, are kept simple. The goal is to model the qualitative effects. Since the developed models are simple, compared to a fully neuromorphic one [9], we have a good chance to implement them on CNN Universal Machine chips [12, 13] using multi-layer technology [14].