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Biomedical subjects

R E Kalil

Publications and source records attributed to R E Kalil.

30 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

Thalamic projections to visual areas of the middle suprasylvian sulcus in the cat.

The thalamic afferents to two areas of the lateral suprasylvian visual cortex in the cat were studied by using retrograde transport of horseradish peroxidase (HRP). Injections were localized retinotopically with electrophysiological recording. The posteromedial lateral suprasylvian area (PMLS) of Palmer et al. ('78) receives afferents from the pulvinar (P), the posterior nucleus of Rioch (PN), the C-laminae of the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGNd) and the centrolateral (CL), lateral posterior (LP), medial interlaminar (MIN) nuclei. The anteromedial lateral suprasylvian area (AMLS) receives afferents from CL, P, LP, PN, MIN, and probably from the posterior nuclear group (PO), and the lateral dorsal (LD) and ventral anterior (VA) nuclei. The LP-pulvinar complex has been divided into four zones on the basis of connectivity: geniculate wing, pulvinar, the lateral division of LP, and the interjacent division of LP (Updyke, '77; Graybiel and Berson, '80; Guillery et al., '80). The locations of labeled cells in the present experiments suggest that both AMLS and PMLS receive afferents from each of the four zones, although differences exist in the strength of the projections. While AMLS and PMLS receive afferents from many of the same nuclei (CL, P, LP, PN, and MIN), differences in their afferents also were noted. These differences are of three types. The first is that some nuclei project to only one of the cortical areas. PMLS alone receives input from the C-laminae of the LGNd while AMLS alone receives probable input from PO, LD, and VA. The second difference is in the strength of the projection from some nuclei. AMLS receives a stronger projection from CL and P than does PMLS. The third difference concerns the pattern of distribution of neurons that project to each cortical area. Labeled cells in LP are dispersed after an AMLS injection, but are found in clusters or bands after a PMLS injection. Thus our results indicate that the thalamic afferents to AMLS and PMLS are in general similar: however, differences in input to AMLS and PMLS suggest that inputs to PMLS are predominantly visual while AMLS receives a broader spectrum of afferent information.

Animals↗

Loss of retinal X-cells in cats with neonatal or adult visual cortex damage.

Recordings were made from single retinal ganglion cell somas in cats whose visual cortical areas 17 and 18 were damaged on the day of birth or in adulthood. Neonatal lesions produced a 78 percent loss of X-cells in the retina, while lesions made in adulthood produced a 22 percent loss. Y-cells and W-cells were unaffected. This retinal abnormality needs to be considered when interpreting studies of behavioral deficits and neural mechanisms of recovery after damage to the visual cortex.

Aging↗

Anomalous retinal pathways in the Siamese cat: an inadequate substrate for normal bioncular vision.

All major retinal pathways in the Siamese cat are abnormal, with almost total crossing of the projections to the pretectum and superior colliculus. These projections represent a marked disruption in the customary neural substrate for binocular vision, which implies a consequent impairment in stereoscopic depth perception. Crossed eyes, commonly seen in the Siamese cat, may therefore arise from a neuroanatomical defect in the primary visual pathways.

Animals↗

Elimination of action potentials blocks the structural development of retinogeniculate synapses.

Although the influence of electrical activity on neural development has been studied extensively, experiments have only recently focused on the role of activity in the development of the mammalian central nervous system (CNS). Using tetrodotoxin (TTX) to abolish sodium-mediated action potentials, studies on the visual system show that impulse activity is essential both for the normal development of neuronal size and responsivity in the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN), and for the eye-specific segregation of geniculo-cortical axons. There have been no anatomical studies to investigate the influence of action potentials on CNS synaptic development. We report here the first direct evidence that elimination of action potentials in the mammalian CNS blocks the growth of developing axon terminals and the formation of normal adult synaptic patterns. Our results show that when TTX is used to eliminate retinal ganglion-cell action potentials in the cat from birth to 8 weeks, the connections made by ganglion cell axons with LGN neurones, retinogeniculate synapses, remain almost identical morphologically to those in the newborn kitten.

Action Potentials↗