Saccadic eye movement

A saccade (/səˈkɑːd/ sə-KAHD, French for jerk) is a quick, simultaneous movement of both eyes between two or more phases of fixation in the same direction. (For clarification, saccade movements are very fast jumps from one eye position to another whereas in smooth pursuit movements, eyes move smoothly instead of in jumps.) The phenomenon can be associated with a shift in frequency of an emitted signal or a movement of a body part or device. Controlled cortically by the frontal eye fields (FEF), or subcortically by the superior colliculus, saccades serve as a mechanism for fixation, rapid eye movement, and the fast phase of optokinetic nystagmus. The word appears to have been coined in the 1880s by French ophthalmologist Émile Javal, who used a mirror on one side of a page to observe eye movement in silent reading, and found that it involves a succession of discontinuous individual movements.

Humans and many animals do not look at a scene in fixed steadiness; instead, the eyes move around, locating interesting parts of the scene and building up a mental, three-dimensional 'map' corresponding to the scene (as opposed to the graphical map of avians, that often relies upon detection of angular movement on the retina). When scanning immediate surroundings or reading, human eyes make jerky saccadic movements and stop several times, moving very quickly between each stop. The speed of movement during each saccade cannot be controlled; the eyes move as fast as they are able. One reason for the saccadic movement of the human eye is that the central part of the retina—known as the fovea—which provides the high-resolution portion of vision is very small in humans, only about 1–2 degrees of vision, but it plays a critical role in resolving objects. By moving the eye so that small parts of a scene can be sensed with greater resolution, body resources can be used more efficiently.

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