Scientists Reveal Never-Before-Seen Color That Only 5 People Have Witnessed Using Lasers

Across all of human history, stretching back millions of years since our earliest ancestors first appeared—just five individuals have ever laid eyes on a particular color that might have existed since the dawn of time itself.

Out of those fortunate enough to witness the color, three were part of the research team behind the discovery, and the other two were colleagues from the University of Washington, based in Seattle.

To make this color visible to the human eye, a specialized process had to be developed. This involved creating a unique 'technicolor technique'. As for why a laser nicknamed 'Oz' was necessary to make the color visible, we need to take a moment to understand the biology behind how we see color in the first place.

In our eyes, specifically on the retina, there are three types of cone cells. These are photoreceptors that are finely tuned to detect different ranges of light wavelengths. S cones are the ones that respond to shorter wavelengths, which our brain interprets as blue. M cones pick up on medium wavelengths, allowing us to perceive green. And L cones are sensitive to the longer wavelengths, which show up as red in our vision.

Our brains then take the signals from these three types of cones and mix them together, creating the full, vivid range of colors we experience in everyday life.

But here's the thing—these cone types don’t operate in isolation. Their sensitivity ranges overlap with each other. So when a certain wavelength activates the M cones, it usually ends up stimulating the S or L cones too, depending on the exact wavelength involved.

Five people have been witnessed a 'new' color known as 'olo' Getty stock

Professor Ren Ng, who teaches electrical engineering and computer science at the University of California, Berkeley, explained the concept to Scientific American by saying: "There's no light in the world that can activate only the M cone cells because, if they are being activated, for sure one or both other types get activated as well."

"The name comes from the Wizard of Oz, where there's a journey to the Emerald City, where things look the most dazzling green you've ever seen," Ng shared with the publication.

Ng is actually one of the rare five people who have seen this newly identified color. It's been given the name 'olo', and he described it as a striking 'blue-green with unprecedented saturation'. The closest known color we have to compare it with is teal, though even that doesn’t quite match its intensity.

Teal, depicted here as an aerial view of a coral reef, is the closest color to 'olo' Getty stock

The research paper’s abstract stated: "We introduce a principle, Oz, for displaying color imagery: directly controlling the human eye's photoreceptor activity via cell-by-cell light delivery."

"Theoretically, novel colors are possible through bypassing the constraints set by the cone spectral sensitivities and activating M cone cells exclusively. In practice, we confirm a partial expansion of color-space toward that theoretical ideal."

"Attempting to activate M cones exclusively is shown to elicit a color beyond the natural human gamut, formally measured with color matching by human subjects. They describe the color as blue-green of unprecedented saturation."

The abstract went on to say: "Further experiments show that subjects perceive Oz colors in image and video form. The prototype targets laser microdoses to thousands of spectrally classified cones under fixational eye motion."

"These results are proof-of-principle for programmable control over individual photoreceptors at population scale."