I am in my early teens and my eyes are changing from blue to green. Sometimes when I look at them they're blue and other times their green. I have recently moved to Seoul, South Korea from Oklahoma, so it might have to do with the environment, or not.
2007-02-25 21:46:18 · 11 answers · asked by tiger_lilies09 2 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Biology
The eye changes you describe are widely reported. For example, in one study, 15% of Caucasians had some lightening or darkening in eye color at puberty. In fact, this study showed there was probably some unknown gene or genes involved in the eye color change.
What is surprising to me is that eye color doesn’t change more often. Eye color is determined by lots of different genes but it all boils down to how much pigment you have in the front part of your iris at any one time. Lots of pigment means brown eyes, a little bit, blue eyes. Other colors come from intermediate amounts of pigment.
The genes involved in eye color determine how much pigment gets made, how quickly it is degraded and where in your iris to put it. In other words, eye color is an ongoing process that is not necessarily set in stone.
So all that has to happen to change eye color is to change the final amount of pigment in your eye. How could that happen?
Remember, genes are just recipes for proteins. When eye color genes are on, proteins that make and degrade eye color pigment are made. The amount of pigment in your eye is determined by how good these proteins are at their job and how many of these proteins are doing their jobs. For example, you get the same amount of pigment if you make a little bit of a good protein or lots of a mediocre protein.
The most likely explanation for a change in eye color is to change the amount of pigment producing proteins made. There are lots of cases where something in the environment changes the amount of protein that is made.
Now, back to your questions. An eye color change at puberty doesn’t seem farfetched considering all the genes that get turned on and off when a child turns into an adult. In fact, maybe the 15% of people whose eyes change color at puberty have an eye color gene that responds to the sex hormones associated with puberty.
As for eyes changing color at various times as an adult, we need to say that there is something in the environment affecting one or more of the eye color genes. There are lots of examples of things in the environment influencing how much a gene is turned on. Stress, for example, is known to affect genes important for the immune system.
The bottom line is that eye color is the result of a constant process of pigment creation and destruction.
2007-02-25 22:41:27 · answer #1 · answered by Niotulove 6 · 3⤊ 0⤋
The same thing happened to me, so I hope we get an explanation for this one! I know how weird this is for you, even if you really like your new eye color. I love my new color, and so do other people...but it's just so strange!
I moved from the Midwest US to Southeast Texas 10 years ago. When I came here, I had medium-brown eyes, and they started to lighten slowly...but over the last 5-6 years, they have changed to green/yellow! The brown just went away like magic!!
(By the way, I was 22 when I came here, so it's not like I was a newborn baby and my eyes were still "settling" on a color.)
2007-02-25 21:56:22 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
I'm not sure what makes this happen. My husband's eyes had always been dark brown, almost black from the time he was born. In the past few years, (maybe 5-6 years) his eyes have changed to green. It's really odd.
2007-02-25 21:49:41 · answer #3 · answered by zil28ennov 6 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Maybe the angle or amount of light which strikes your eye is different each time you look at your eye and it seems to appear a different colour.
2007-02-25 21:49:51 · answer #4 · answered by Kika 2 · 3⤊ 0⤋
i comprehend a female who has brown eyes a super sort of the time. yet on days that are sunny outdoors, her eyes turn green. And on different days, they turn the two blue or according to danger a yellow-green. besides, its time-honored, yet its so cool!
2016-10-16 12:36:25 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Pigmentation.
2007-02-25 21:57:56 · answer #6 · answered by ag_iitkgp 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Its normal for eyes to change color as you get older, usualy during adolescence. Wikipedia has a good informative and pretty interesting article about eye color. :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_color
2007-02-25 21:50:31 · answer #7 · answered by indithral11 2 · 2⤊ 0⤋
I am black.
My eye color began changing several years ago. From dark brown to hazel, new bluish grey. I think it has to do with my sight failing.
2007-02-25 21:49:43 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 0⤋
maybe you blew a fuse. That happens alot to me when I do too much homework
2007-02-25 21:50:38 · answer #9 · answered by sandman4ever6 2 · 1⤊ 1⤋
It can mean just ONE thing:
YOU ARE ABOUT TO DIE.
Waaaaahaaaaaaaaa, Sniff Sniff
I'll be present at your funeral.
2007-02-25 21:50:41 · answer #10 · answered by Nishaant 3 · 1⤊ 3⤋