Martina Poletti

Martina Poletti is an Associate Professor in the Department of Brain & Cognitive Sciences and affiliated with the Center for Visual Science at the University of Rochester. Her research focuses on understanding the interplay between eye movements, visual perception, and neural processing within the fovea and foveola. She investigates how fixational eye movements like microsaccades modulate visual acuity, crowding, and attentional mechanisms at the finest spatial scales.

Key research areas include foveal anatomy, temporal dynamics of visual processing during fixation, and the neural correlates of spatial resolution. Her work employs advanced techniques such as adaptive optics retinal imaging and high-resolution psychophysics to study how microscopic eye movements compensate for the nonhomogeneous structure of the human fovea.

Recent studies explore how attention interacts with oculomotor behavior to enhance fine-grained visual discrimination, and how individual differences in fixational instability (e.g., eye drift) relate to perceptual capabilities. She also examines the functional consequences of retinal anatomy on visual performance, including cone density gradients and their impact on visual crowding.

No specific scientific awards or grants are listed in the provided materials. Her research group collaborates across disciplines, integrating insights from neuroscience, psychophysics, and engineering to advance understanding of active vision systems.