From a blue sky to red-hot coals, colour tells us a lot about the world. But although it seems objective, the way we see colour is unique to humans and could have turned out very differently. What's more, our colour vision has some odd quirks to it, making it likely that it evolved to cope with a specific set of conditions. What were those conditions, and how did our vision evolve to get around them? Quentin Cooper talks with Dr Petroc Sumner of Imperial
College, London, who's been investigating whether our perception of colour improved our ancestors' attempts at foraging forfood.
Producer Sarah Empey EMAIL: material.world@bbc.co.uk