[citation needed] Cerebral achromatopsia differs from other forms of color blindness in subtle but important ways.

It is a consequence of cortical damage that arises through ischemia or infarction of a specific area in the ventral occipitotemporal cortex of humans.

[2] It is unknown whether this was the result of bilateral lesions being more likely to produce color-loss symptoms, or if it was a sampling effect of patients with more severe brain trauma more often being admitted for treatment.

However, as applied to achromatopia resulting from brain trauma, the term is incomplete in characterizing the often-complex nature of the vision loss.

[citation needed] In still rarer cases, temporary ischemia of the associated ventral occipital cortex can result in transient achromatopsia.

The ischemia caused by lesions on the posterior cerebral arteries had subsided and follow up MRI scans indicated that blood flow had once again returned to the ventral occipital cortex.

[citation needed] The most common disorder seen alongside cerebral achromatopsia is prosopagnosia, the inability to recognize or recall faces.

[1] Non-invasive imaging techniques can be the most helpful in determining whether the area of damage following a traumatic event is correlated with color-vision processing.

Simple diagnostic tools can also be used to determine whether a patient is a likely candidate for further testing, as advancing imaging procedures can often prove expensive and unnecessary.

The correlation is still the subject of ongoing research, but the most telltale clue in this association is the close proximity of brain lesions seen in prosopagnosics and those with cerebral achromatopsia without prosopagnosia.

[5] but the evidence was dismissed by both Gordon Holmes and Salomon Henschen, two eminent neurologists who had identified the position and limits of the primary visual cortex.

[9] Using the fMRI, researchers examined the areas of blood oxygenation in the occipital lobe as the subject viewed various color-specific stimuli.

The next portion of the study used an electrode implanted in the right hemisphere in the location identified by the fMRI scan as pertaining to color processing.

Color vision research is a well-studied field of modern neuroscience and the underlying anatomical processing in the retina have been well categorized.

's experience with cerebral achromatopsia from the point where an injury to his occipital lobe leaves him without the ability to perceive color, through his subsequent struggles to adapt to a black, white and gray world, and finally to his acceptance and even gratitude for his condition.