title: Identification of a Retinal Circuit for Recurrent Suppression Using Indirect Electrical Imaging.
abstract: Understanding the function of modulatory interneuron networks is a major challenge, because such networks typically operate over long spatial scales and involve many neurons of different types. Here, we use an indirect electrical imaging method to reveal the function of a spatially extended, recurrent retinal circuit composed of two cell types. This recurrent circuit produces peripheral response suppression of early visual signals in the primate magnocellular visual pathway. We identify a type of polyaxonal amacrine cell physiologically via its distinctive electrical signature, revealed by electrical coupling with ON parasol retinal ganglion cells recorded using a large-scale multi-electrode array. Coupling causes the amacrine cells to fire spikes that propagate radially over long distances, producing GABA-ergic inhibition of other ON parasol cells recorded near the amacrine cell axonal projections. We propose and test a model for the function of this amacrine cell type, in which the extra-classical receptive field of ON parasol cells is formed by reciprocal inhibition from other ON parasol cells in the periphery, via the electrically coupled amacrine cell network.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neuroscience, Carl von Ossietzky University, Oldenburg 26129, Germany; Systems Neurobiology, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA. Electronic address: martin.greschner@uni-oldenburg.de.
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Greschner
authors.affiliation: Systems Neurobiology, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
authors.forename: Alexander K
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Heitman
authors.affiliation: Systems Neurobiology, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA; Department of Neurobiology, Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, NC 27710, USA.
authors.forename: Greg D
authors.initials: GD
authors.lastname: Field
authors.affiliation: Systems Neurobiology, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
authors.forename: Peter H
authors.initials: PH
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Systems Neurobiology, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Ahn
authors.affiliation: Santa Cruz Institute for Particle Physics, University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA.
authors.forename: Alexander
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sher
authors.affiliation: Santa Cruz Institute for Particle Physics, University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA.
authors.forename: Alan M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Litke
authors.affiliation: Systems Neurobiology, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA; Departments of Neurosurgery and Ophthalmology and Hansen Experimental Physics Laboratory, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA.
authors.forename: E J
authors.initials: EJ
authors.lastname: Chichilnisky
mesh_terms: D025042:Amacrine Cells / Q000502:physiology; D000818:Animals; D055724:Electrophysiological Phenomena; D007395:Interneurons / Q000502:physiology*; D008252:Macaca fascicularis / Q000502:physiology*; D008253:Macaca mulatta / Q000502:physiology*; D012160:Retina / Q000502:physiology*; D014795:Visual Pathways / Q000502:physiology*