How Your Eyes Stay Steady

Your eyes stay locked on target even when your head moves because of a reflex most people never

know exists. The vestibulo-ocular reflex happens in your inner ear, specifically inside

a structure called the utricle. When your head turns right, tiny calcium crystals

called statoconia shift and fall, dragging a gelatinous layer beneath them. This movement bends

specialized hair cells at the bottom, triggering instant depolarization shown here in red.

Those hair cells fire nerve signals that race through the vestibular nuclei, shoot up the medial

longitudinal fasciculus, and hit cranial nerves three, four, and six.

Within milliseconds, your eye muscles receive the command and counter rotate left,