Dresden 2017 – scientific programme

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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 29: Posters - Multi-Cellular Systems

BP 29.7: Poster

Tuesday, March 21, 2017, 14:00–16:00, P2-EG

Direct measurements reveal significant improvement in retinal light transmission due to photoreceptor nuclear inversion — •Kaushikaram Subramanian¹, Martin Weigert¹, Irina Solovei², and Moritz Kreysing¹ — ¹Max Plank Institute of Molecular Cell Biology & Genetics, Dresden, Germany — ²Department of Biology, Ludwig Maximilian University, Munich, Germany

The vertebrate retina bears the odd evolutionary heritage of being in- verted, necessitating photons to travel through hundreds of microns of living neuronal tissue before detection by photoreceptor cell (PRC) outer-segments. The large number of PRCs results in densely packed nuclei in the tissue which can potentially scatter light. Postnatal retinal PRC nuclei in nocturnal mammals undergo a hallmark process of inversion in their chromatin architecture [1]. Interferometric measurements and simulations, suggested that this chromatin rearrangement could lead to reduced light scattering and that each nuclei possess optical quality of lenses [2]. Using the concept of modulation transfer, we show that optical transmission of wild type (WT) mouse adult retina is significantly better than a WT retina in its postnatal development stages. Also, WT retina has a significantly higher strehl ratio than retina of a transgenic mouse where this inversion does not take place. We also complement these results with simulations to develop a mechanistic understanding of the light propagation in these tissues and visual behavioral studies. References [1] Solovei et al, Cell, 137(2) (2009) [2] Błaszczak et al, Opt Express, 22(9) (2014)