Visual system articles within Nature

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  • Article |

    Organogenesis relies on the orchestration of many cellular interactions to create the collective cell behaviours that progressively shape developing tissues. Using a three-dimensional embryonic stem cell culture system, this study successfully generated neural retinal tissues that formed a fully stratified neural retinal structure with all the major components located in their proper spatial location as seen during optic-cup development in vivo. This approach might have important implications for stem cell therapy for retinal repair.

    • Mototsugu Eiraku
    • , Nozomu Takata
    •  & Yoshiki Sasai

  • Brief Communications Arising |

    • Wolfgang Wiltschko
    • , Joachim Traudt
    •  & Roswitha Wiltschko

  • Article |

    To date, various aspects of connectivity have been inferred from electron microscopy (EM) of synaptic contacts, light microscopy of axonal and dendritic arbors, and correlations in activity. However, until now it has not been possible to relate the complex structural wiring between neurons to the function of individual cells. Using a combination of functional imaging and three-dimensional serial EM reconstruction at unprecedented scale, two papers now describe the connectivity of single cells in the mouse visual system. This study investigates the connectivity of inhibitory interneurons in primary visual cortex.

    • Davi D. Bock
    • , Wei-Chung Allen Lee
    •  & R. Clay Reid

  • Article |

    To date, various aspects of connectivity have been inferred from electron microscopy (EM) of synaptic contacts, light microscopy of axonal and dendritic arbors, and correlations in activity. However, until now it has not been possible to relate the complex structural wiring between neurons to the function of individual cells. Using a combination of functional imaging and three-dimensional serial EM reconstruction at unprecedented scale, two papers now describe the connectivity of single cells in the mouse visual system. This study examines how the selectivity of directionally selective retinal ganglion cells may arise from their asymmetry in the wiring with amacrine cells.

    • Kevin L. Briggman
    • , Moritz Helmstaedter
    •  & Winfried Denk

  • News Feature |

    There is more to the eye than rods and cones — the discovery of a third photoreceptor is rewriting the visual rulebook.

    • Corie Lok

  • Letter |

    In the retina, highly selective wiring from inhibitory cells contributes to determine the direction-selection characteristics of an individual ganglion cell, yet how the asymmetric wiring inherent to these connections is established was unknown. Here, two independent studies using complementary techniques, including pharmacology, electrophysiology and optogenetics, find that although inhibitory inputs to both sides of the direction-selective cell are uniform early in development, by the second postnatal week, inhibitory synapses on the null side strengthen whereas those on the preferred side remain constant. These plasticity changes occur independent of neural activity, indicating that a specific developmental program is executed to produce the direction-selective circuitry in the retina.

    • Keisuke Yonehara
    • , Kamill Balint
    •  & Botond Roska

  • Letter |

    In the retina, highly selective wiring from inhibitory cells contributes to determine the direction-selection characteristics of an individual ganglion cell, yet how the asymmetric wiring inherent to these connections is established was unknown. Here, two independent studies using complementary techniques, including pharmacology, electrophysiology and optogenetics, find that although inhibitory inputs to both sides of the direction-selective cell are uniform early in development, by the second postnatal week, inhibitory synapses on the null side strengthen whereas those on the preferred side remain constant. These plasticity changes occur independent of neural activity, indicating that a specific developmental program is executed to produce the direction-selective circuitry in the retina.

    • Wei Wei
    • , Aaron M. Hamby
    •  & Marla B. Feller

  • News & Views |

    In both fruitflies and vertebrates, signals from photoreceptor cells are immediately split into two opposing channels in the downstream neurons. This might facilitate the computation of visual motion. See Letter p.300

    • Chi -Hon Lee

  • Letter |

    Ramón y Cajal, the founding father of neuroscience, observed similarities between the vertebrate retina and the insect eye, but that was based purely on anatomy. Using state-of-the-art genetics and electrophysiology in the fruitfly, these authors distinguish motion-sensitive neurons responding to abrupt increases in light from those specific to light decrements, thus bringing the similarity with vertebrate circuitry to the functional level.

    • Maximilian Joesch
    • , Bettina Schnell
    •  & Alexander Borst

  • Letter |

    Neurons in the medial temporal lobe are selectively responsive to particular visual objects, but their activity is modulated by internal cognitive effects. Here it is shown that humans can regulate the activity of their MTL neurons to alter the outcome of the contest between external images and their internal representation. Using a brain–machine interface, subjects looked at a hybrid superposition of two images and had to enhance one image at the expense of the other, using cognitive strategies such as attention and imagery.

    • Moran Cerf
    • , Nikhil Thiruvengadam
    •  & Itzhak Fried

  • News & Views |

    How do we tell red from green? Work on the primate retina shows how neural circuitry combines signals from individual cone photoreceptor cells to provide the basic building blocks for colour vision. See Article p.673

    • Jonathan B. Demb
    •  & David H. Brainard

  • Article |

    Colour perception arises from the comparison of signals from different cone types, but how these inputs are combined by ganglion cells, which transmit the output of the retina, has been an issue of contention. Using large-scale multi-electrode arrays and fine-grained visual stimulation, these authors map out the locations and types of single-cone inputs to entire populations of ganglion cells, resulting in input–output maps at an unprecedented resolution and scale.

    • Greg D. Field
    • , Jeffrey L. Gauthier
    •  & E. J. Chichilnisky

  • News & Views |

    Work on stem cells is one of the hottest research areas in biology. But are such studies of any therapeutic value? Fortunately, yes, as is evident from successes in treating blindness.

    • Elena Ezhkova
    •  & Elaine Fuchs

  • Letter |

    Sensory cortical neurons are interconnected at different scales, and this could be related to differences in functional interactions. Using maximum entropy models, these authors explore the correlation structure of neurons in primary visual cortex of anaesthetized monkeys recorded using multiple tetrodes. They conclude that distant neurons display pairwise correlations but that local networks can have more complex interactions that may act to sparsify the neural code.

    • Ifije E. Ohiorhenuan
    • , Ferenc Mechler
    •  & Jonathan D. Victor

  • Letter |

    The primary visual cortex (V1) is crucial for vision, yet people with V1 injuries might still point to or avoid visual stimuli, despite having no conscious perception of them. It has been thought that this 'blindsight' relies on visual pathways that bypass the usual route from lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) to V1. But it is shown here — using a combination of permanent and reversible lesions, behavioural testing and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) mapping — that a critical link in the alternative pathway is in fact the LGN.

    • Michael C. Schmid
    • , Sylwia W. Mrowka
    •  & David A. Leopold

  • News & Views |

    A neuron can receive thousands of inputs that, together, tell it when to fire. New techniques can image the activity of many inputs, and shed light on how single neurons perform computations in response.

    • Nicholas J. Priebe
    •  & David Ferster

  • Article |

    Many sensory neurons in the mammalian cortex are tuned to specific stimulus features — for example, some fire only when horizontal bars move from top to bottom in the visual field. But it has been unclear whether such tuning is encoded in a neuron's inputs, or whether the neuron itself computes its response. Here, a new technique for visualizing and mapping sensory inputs to the dendrites of neurons in the mouse visual cortex has shown that each neuron makes its own 'decision' as to the orientation preference of its output.

    • Hongbo Jia
    • , Nathalie L. Rochefort
    •  & Arthur Konnerth

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