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Steven schwartz ophthalmologist3/28/2024 ![]() That is why it is hard to detect neurological problems until the deficiency becomes very severe." Homeostatic mechanisms that respond to injury and disease typically cover up the deficiency. The study is published in the peer-reviewed journal of Current Biology. The investigators examined membrane properties of cones in mice following the degeneration of rods. The patch clamp recording method is a laboratory technique for studying currents in living cells while controlling the cell's membrane potential, or membrane voltage. These single cell recordings can establish key features of the cell's activity, including the presence of specific membrane currents, whether the cell has light responses, and whether they might connect to downstream neurons in the retina. In addition, the investigators used multi-electrode array recordings that establish the activity of all retinal ganglion cells, and that can show the ganglion cell's ability to respond to visual stimuli that vary in spatial location over time. These recordings revealed that the remaining cones in a retina where the rods have mostly degenerated were still functional. Although the anatomic specializations that are responsible for generating the light response - or phototransduction - and the synaptic connection to downstream cells were missing, these functions remained with less sensitivity than normal. These cells still display many of the features of normal cones, including a similar resting membrane potential, a normal synaptic Ca2+ current, and light responses even though they no longer have the part of the cell that was traditionally thought needed for the light response. "These important results may suggest a future path forward for patients with conditions thought to be causing irreversible retinal blindness, as photoreceptor or cone viability in tissue was previously thought to be irreparably damaged," said Dr.įurthermore, the ganglion cells retain their ability to respond to visual stimuli with similar spatial and temporal sensitivity. ![]() Steven Schwartz, Ahmanson chair in ophthalmology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, and professor and Retina Division chief at the UCLA Jules Stein Eye Institute. The next step for researchers is to establish the extent to which the neuroprotection or enhancement of the dormant cones will allow the rescue of vision in various forms of blindness. The researchers were supported by grants from the National Eye Institute (R01EY033035, R01EY027442, R01EY27193, R01EY001844, R01EY27193 and EY29817), a fellowship of the UCLA EyeSTAR program of the UCLA Department of Ophthalmology, a BrightFocus Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship, an unrestricted grant from Research to Prevent Blindness USA to the UCLA Department of Ophthalmology and National Eye Institute Core Grant (P30) EY00311 to the Jules Stein Eye Institute. Erika Ellis, Antonio Paniagua, Yuekan Jiao, David Williams, Gordon Fain, all of UCLA and Miranda Scalabrino, Mishek Thapa, Jay Rathinavelu and Greg Field, all of Duke University. ![]()
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