In the Visual Thalamus, Neurons are in Contact With Both Eyes but Respond to Only One
upstart writes:
In the visual thalamus, neurons are in contact with both eyes but respond to only one:
We have two eyes, but perceive the tree in front of us only once. Our brain therefore has the complicated task of combining the information of both eyes in a meaningful way. To do so, visual stimuli first travel from the retina via so-called ganglion cells to the visual thalamus. There, the information does end up in clearly defined areas -- depending on the type and eye-of-origin of retinal ganglion cells transporting the visual stimuli. Signals from the right and left eye are thus clearly separated in the visual thalamus and independently transmitted to the visual cortex. Only in this brain region, the incoming information is combined -- at least according to a long-standing theory.
However, recent anatomical studies describe that a surprising number of neurons in the mouse visual thalamus has contact to both eyes. Does the separation of 'left eye' and 'right eye' information channels not hold true in mice? Scientists from Tobias Bonhoeffer's department wanted to shed more light on this newly raised question. They further developed an optogenetic method, so that they could activate ganglion cells of both eyes successively with light of different colors and measure the corresponding electrical responses in a thalamic cell.
Journal Reference:
Joel Bauer, Simon Weiler, Martin H.P. Fernholz, David Laubender, Volker Scheuss, Mark Hubener, Tobias Bonhoeffer, Tobias Rose. Limited functional convergence of eye-specific inputs in the retinogeniculate pathway of the mouse. Neuron, 2021; DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2021.05.036
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