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The Journal of Neuroscience, April 1, 2003, 23(7):2645
Different Circuits for ON and OFF Retinal Ganglion Cells Cause
Different Contrast Sensitivities
Kareem A.
Zaghloul1,
Kwabena
Boahen2, and
Jonathan B.
Demb1
Departments of 1 Neuroscience and
2 Bioengineering, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania 19104-6058
The theory of "parallel pathways" predicts that, except for a
sign reversal, ON and OFF ganglion cells are driven by a similar presynaptic circuit. To test this hypothesis, we measured synaptic inputs to ON and OFF cells as reflected in the subthreshold membrane potential. We made intracellular recordings from brisk-transient (Y)
cells in the in vitro guinea pig retina and show that ON
and OFF cells in fact express significant asymmetries in their synaptic inputs. An ON cell receives relatively linear input that modulates a
single excitatory conductance; whereas an OFF cell receives rectified
input that modulates both inhibitory and excitatory conductances. The
ON pathway, blocked by L-AP-4, tonically inhibits an OFF
cell at mean luminance and phasically inhibits an OFF cell during a
light increment. Our results suggest that basal glutamate release is
high at ON but not OFF bipolar terminals, and inhibition between
pathways is unidirectional: ON OFF. These circuit asymmetries explain asymmetric contrast sensitivity observed in spiking behavior.
Key words:
white noise; linear-nonlinear model; receptive
field center; APB; photopic vision; cell
Copyright © 2003 Society for Neuroscience 0270-6474/03/2372645-10$05.00/0
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