Rod-Cone Interaction in Vertebrate Vision

脊椎动物眼睛后部的组织是视网膜，它包含感光细胞和其他几种视觉细胞。这两类光感受器分别是杆状细胞和锥状细胞，杆状细胞负责昏暗的光线，锥状细胞负责在明亮的光线下感知颜色。现在看来，视杆细胞对视锥细胞的反应有抑制作用，这取决于视杆细胞对黑暗的适应程度。这些抑制杆锥相互作用（SCRI）的机制尚不清楚。该项目将结合视网膜神经元膜特性的神经生理学记录和突触通讯的药理学探测，突触是细胞间神经化学传递的功能性接触。以两栖动物视网膜为模型，将结果与已知的心理物理学研究中关于锥体介导的敏感性及其与人类黑暗适应的相互作用的特征进行比较。这一新现象的研究结果预计将对视觉科学、信号处理和网络神经科学产生影响。

The tissue at the back of the vertebrate eye is the retina, which contains photoreceptors and several other classes of visual cells. The two classes of photoreceptors are rods, for dim light, and cones, for color vision in bright light. It now appears that there is a suppressive effect by the rods on the cone cell responses, depending on the level of dark adaptation of the rods. The mechanisms for these suppressive rod-cone interactions (SCRI) are not clear. This project will combine neurophysiological recording of membrane properties from retinal neurons, and pharmacological probing of the communication at synapses which are the functional contacts for neurochemical transmission between cells. Using the amphibian retina as a model, results will be compared to the features known from psychophysical studies on cone-mediated sensitivity and its interaction with dark adaptation in humans. Results from study of this novel phenomenon are expected to have an impact on visual science in general, on signal processing, and on network neuroscience.