A method for detecting optokinetic nystagmus based on the optic flow of the limbus

•A new image processing technique identifies the presence of optokinetic nystagmus.•Its accuracy is 93% against 98% for an experienced human observer.•It yields consistent responses with 5 and 10 deg/s gratings, and no OKN for 0 deg/s.

Optokinetic nystagmus (OKN) is the sawtooth movement of the eye elicited when an observer views a repeated moving pattern. We present a method for identifying the presence and direction of OKN in recordings of the eye made using a standard off-the-shelf video-camera or webcam. Our approach uses vertical edge detection to determine the limbus/iris boundary, and we estimate the velocity of the edge using Lucas-Kanade optical flow. Heuristic rules are applied to identify saccadic velocity peaks from the resulting velocity signal. The normalized average of the resulting peaks is used to estimate the presence/direction of OKN. Our preliminary testing with six participants observing global motion stimuli with full or partial coherence yields an accuracy of 93% which compares favorably to the performance of an experienced human observer (98% accuracy). Additional tests using high contrast, square-wave gratings show that performance of the technique is consistent at stimulus speeds of 5 and 10 deg/s and that OKN is not reported by the algorithm when participants view stationary stimuli.