title: The great escape of glutamate from the depth of presynaptic invaginations.
abstract: The basal pole of a cone photoreceptor is in close contact with hundreds of bipolar cell dendrites. The function and properties of these unconventional junctions are a long-standing mystery. In this issue of Neuron, DeVries and colleagues provide compelling evidence that glutamate release from a single quanta can diffuse to distant AMPA/KA receptors on these basal junctions to generate slow mEPSCs.
authors.affiliation: Division of Cerebral Structure, National Institute for Physiological Sciences, Okazaki 444-8787, Japan.
authors.forename: Ko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Matsui
authors.forename: Henrique
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: von Gersdorff
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D019706:Excitatory Postsynaptic Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D018698:Glutamic Acid / Q000378:metabolism*; D017729:Presynaptic Terminals / Q000378:metabolism*; D051245:Retinal Bipolar Cells / Q000502:physiology; D017949:Retinal Cone Photoreceptor Cells / Q000502:physiology* / Q000648:ultrastructure; D009435:Synaptic Transmission / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D018698:Glutamic Acid