visual neuroscience · são paulo, brazil

perception and action during active vision

we investigate the behavioural effects and neural mechanisms of eye movements on perception and action

approach
behaviour + psychophysics + neurophysiology
models
humans + non-human primates
affiliation
university of são paulo + federal university of rio de janeiro + ernst strüngmann institute
eye movements during visual foraging eight gratings in a vertically oriented poisson-like arrangement, with two previous saccades and one upcoming animated saccade. selected target planned saccade

research programme

vision is an active process.

our work asks how the visual system selects, predicts and stabilises information around each eye movement.

selection

presaccadic perception

how visual sensitivity and neural representations change at the future point of fixation before saccades.

active sampling

foraging and visual search

investigating perception and decision making in naturalistic tasks.

dynamics

neural mechanisms of active vision

how neuronal populations across the visual and oculomotor systems coordinate perception and action.

methods

from behaviour to neural populations.

psychophysics

quantifying perception under controlled visual and temporal conditions.

eye tracking

resolving the preparation, execution and consequences of saccadic eye movements.

eeg & meg

tracking fast neural dynamics across the human brain.

electrophysiology

recording neuronal populations in non-human primates during active visual behaviour.

people

a collaborative laboratory for active vision.

our team brings together researchers across career stages and institutions to study visual perception, attention, expectation and eye movements.

members of activislab together outdoorsmeet the team

featured paper

dissociable effects of feature expectation on saccades and presaccadic perception

our recent work asks whether expectations influence perceptual sensitivity and eye-movement initiation through the same mechanisms.

view all publications

recent work

latest papers and preprints.

2026

preprint

dissociable effects of feature expectation on saccades and presaccadic perception

l. z. bortoluzzi & g. rohenkohl · biorxiv

view publication
2025

research article

presaccadic modulation of lateral interactions

g. mueller de melo, i.o. pitorri & g. rohenkohl · journal of vision 25, 7

view publication
2025

research article

presaccadic attentional shifts are not modulated by saccade amplitude

l. z. bortoluzzi, e. carlos-lima, g. mueller de melo, m. h. s. zhu & g. rohenkohl · scientific reports 15, 27780

view publication
view the full publication list

join the laboratory

interested in how the brain sees and acts?

we welcome enquiries from prospective undergraduate researchers, graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and collaborators whose interests connect with active vision.

current opportunities