On modeling the spatiotemporal processing characteristics of the retina

This work addresses the yet unaswered question of the retina's net functionality. Focusing on the spatiotemporal aspects of retinal processing, existing retina models are analyzed with respect to their capability to: provide specific desired functionality; and reproduce experimental data known from neurobiology. It turns out that a number of existing models can be put on a common basis: a canonical model that subsumes these models. A detailed analysis of this canonical model along with a functionality reduced derivative of it, shows that both models can indeed reproduce a number of experimental data and realize some proposed functionalities. Apart from the exposition of the analysis, this work provides a detailed introduction to the neurobiology of the retina, proposed retina models, and functionalities.