Oculomotor Lab

Dr. Miriam Spering

News

Our lab continues to be generously funded by NSERC, and Miriam has been awarded an Accelerator award for three years on top of her Discovery Grant.

Miriam has been awarded the Women in Cognitive Science Canada (WiCS) Mentorship Award in 2021 and received a Killam Research Fellowship and Humboldt Fellowship for Experienced Researchers for her 2021/22 sabbatical.

Recent Papers

Kreyenmeier, P., Kaemmer, L., Fooken, J., & Spering, M. (2022). Humans can track but fail to predict accelerating objects. eNeuro, 9(5): 1-15.[pdf]
Spering, M. (2022). Eye movements as window into decision making. Annual Review of Vision Science, 8: 9.1-9.22.[pdf]

Welcome to the Oculomotor Lab in the Department of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver. The lab is directed by Dr. Miriam Spering. We are located on the 2nd floor of Koerner Pavilion at UBC Hospital.

Research in Dr. Spering's lab focuses on how we use visual information to control movement. We use ultra-fast display technology, eye tracking and motion capture to study vision, eye and hand movements in healthy adults, athletes, and patients with sensorimotor deficits.

Our research has many applications. For instance, a type of eye movement known as smooth pursuit is used to stabilize gaze on a moving object of interest and critically assists vision. Deficits in the perception of visual motion and the pursuit tracking of moving objects have been described in many conditions, such as Parkinson’s disease or schizophrenia. Our clinical research projects focus on using eye movements as sensitive indicators of disease processes and developing technology for eye-movement-aided diagnosis. We have also developed vision and eye movement tests for the UBC Baseball team.

We acknowledge research funding from NSERC, CFI John R. Evans Leaders Fund and the UBC Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies.