Photopsin absorb light at different wavelengths as retinal-bound pigments. Humans have three different photoreceptor proteins ("photopsin" or "cone opsins") which are found in cone cells and which are responsible for colour vision: George Wald received the 1967 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his experiments in the 1950s that showed the difference in absorbance by these photopsins (see image). Photopsin Photopsins (also known as Cone opsins) are the photoreceptor proteins found in the cone cells of the retina that are the basis of color vision. Iodopsin, the cone pigment system in chicken retina, is a close analog of the "visual
George Wald methods to extract pigments from the retina. Then, using a spectrophotometer, they were able to measure the light absorbance of the pigments. Since the absorbance of light by retina pigments corresponds to the wavelengths that best activate photoreceptor cells, this experiment showed the wavelengths that the eye could best detect. However, since rod cells make up most of the retina, what Wald and his colleagues were specifically measuring was the absorbance of rhodopsin, the main photopigment in rods. Later, with a technique called microspectrophotometry, he was able to measure the absorbance directly from cells, rather than from an extract of