Direction-Selective Dendritic Action Potentials in Rabbit Retina

Direction-Selective Dendritic Action Potentials in Rabbit Retina

Dendritic spikes that propagate toward the soma are well documented, but their physiological role remains uncertain. Our in vitro patch-clamp recordings and two-photon calcium imaging show that direction-selective retinal ganglion cells (DSGCs) utilize orthograde dendritic spikes during physiological activity. DSGCs signal the direction of image motion. Excitatory subthreshold postsynaptic pote...

Dendritic relationship between starburst amacrine cells and direction-selective ganglion cells in the rabbit retina.

We investigated the dendritic relationship between starburst amacrine cells (SAs) and morphologically and physiologically characterized ON and ON-OFF direction-selective ganglion cells (DSGCs) in the rabbit retina. ON and ON-OFF DSGCs were found to exhibit tight dendritic cofasciculation with the SA plexus, visualized by immunolabelling of the vesicular acetylcholine transporter (VAChT). The de...

Direction-selective units in rabbit retina: distribution of preferred directions.

The preferred directions of 102 direction-selective ganglion cells in the rabbit retina have been determined. Cells of the "on-off" type form four nonoverlapping groups; cells of the "on" type fall into three groups. The on-off groups appear to correspond to the directions of apparent object displacement produced by contractions of the four rectus muscles. Each group of cells could, without fur...

Territorial organization of direction-selective ganglion cells in rabbit retina.

The On-Off direction-selective (DS) ganglion cells in the rabbit retina comprise four discrete subtypes that orthogonally code the direction of image motion. This study examined the dendritic relationships between different subtypes of On-Off DS cells, which were identified by their distinctive type 1 bistratified (BiS1) morphology following the intracellular injection of a biotinylated tracer ...

Direction-Selective Ganglion Cells in the Retina