  We show that the statistics of an edge type variable in natural images
exhibits self-similarity properties which resemble those of local energy
dissipation in turbulent flows. Our results show that extended self-similarity
remarkably holds for the statistics of the local edge variance, and that the
very same models can be used to predict all the associated exponents. These
results suggest to use natural images as a laboratory for testing scaling
models of interest for the statistical description of turbulent flows. The
properties we have exhibited are relevant for the modeling of the early visual
system: they should be included in models designed for the prediction of
receptive fiel$
