Opening your eyes when you wake up in the morning, you don’t think about all the things going on that contribute to your ability to see.

The American Optometric Association (AOA) explains how our eyes work:

First, light reflects off of an object, entering the cornea of your eye – the outer covering. The cornea bends the light rays through the round hole of your pupil. Your iris – the colored part of your eye – then opens or closes depending on the amount of light coming through. This is why your pupil gets larger or smaller.

The rays pass through your lens next, which also changes shape to bend the rays and focus them on your retina. Your retina is a layer of tissue which contains light-sensing nerve cells. They are called rods and cones because of how they are shaped. Rods provide peripheral vision and allow you to see motion and to see in dim light or at night. Cones are what perceive color and work best in brighter light.

The rods and cones convert the light into electrical impulses which can then be sent to the brain, producing the image you see when you open your eyes.

Click here to learn more and to view an illustration of your eye: https://www.aoa.org/patients-and-public/resources-for-teachers/how-your-eyes-work