Leung Lab Blog

Genetics

1. Zu Y, Tong X, Wang Z, Liu D, Pan R, Li Z, Hu Y, Luo Z, Huang P, Wu Q, Zhu Z, Zhang B, Lin S. TALEN-mediated precise genome modification by homologous recombination in zebrafish. Nat Methods. 2013 Feb 24. doi: 10.1038/nmeth.2374. [Epub ahead of print] PubMed PMID: 23435258.
2. Chang N, Sun C, Gao L, Zhu D, Xu X, Zhu X, Xiong JW, Xi JJ. Genome editing with RNA-guided Cas9 nuclease in Zebrafish embryos. Cell Res. 2013 Apr;23(4):465-72. doi: 10.1038/cr.2013.45. Epub 2013 Mar 26. PubMed PMID: 23528705; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC3616424.

Retinal development

1. Chiodini F, Matter-Sadzinski L, Rodrigues T, Skowronska-Krawczyk D, Brodier L, Schaad O, Bauer C, Ballivet M, Matter JM. A Positive Feedback Loop between ATOH7 and a Notch Effector Regulates Cell-Cycle Progression and Neurogenesis in the Retina. Cell Rep. 2013 Mar 28;3(3):796-807. doi: 10.1016/j.celrep.2013.01.035. Epub 2013 Feb 21. PubMed PMID: 23434507.

Eye diseases

1. From the Telegraph: Eye drops could treat macular degeneration. Original article in Cell Metabolism: Impaired Cholesterol Efflux in Senescent Macrophages Promotes Age-Related Macular Degeneration.
2. From the Washington Post: First U.S. artificial retina approved; device could restore some sight to blind. FDA’s news release.

Neuroscience

1. Blackiston DJ, Levin M. Ectopic eyes outside the head in Xenopus tadpoles provide sensory data for light-mediated learning. J Exp Biol. 2013 Mar 15;216(Pt 6):1031-40. doi: 10.1242/jeb.074963. PubMed PMID: 23447666.
   • Commentary: Tadpoles See with Extra Eyes
   • Very interesting article. It demonstrates how tadpole can sense light by the innervation from an ectopic eye.

Since our lab is studying retina, I am intrigued in reading this article about the limitation of retina display by Apple, how we see and the future of developing better displays.

From cultofmac by John Brownlee: Why Retina Isn’t Enough

Apple’s new MacBook Pro follows the fine tradition of the iPhone 4 and third-gen iPad in that it has a super high-resolution Retina display: a 2880 x 1800 panel with an amazing 220 pixels packed in per inch.

It’s an incredible display. In fact, it’s such an incredible display that it actually has about one million, seven hundred thousand pixels more than it needs to satisfy Apple’s definition of Retina, leading some to claim that those pixels are all going to waste.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Apple’s new MacBook Pros have absolutely great displays, but they need every single pixel they have, because the truth of the matter is that Apple’s got a long way to go before it catches its display tech up to the incredible power of human vision. And that’s a good thing, because it means we’ve got a lot to look forward to.

From http://www.cultofmac.com

I read several classic papers when I am planning projects with some of you. This is a very good review paper on the fundamental architecture of retina. There are a lot useful histological facts and observations. It has great discussions on how the retinal architecture has evolved and in turn provides the necessary visual functions to the animal. I believe you will also find this review paper useful.

Reference

Masland RH. The fundamental plan of the retina. Nat Neurosci. 2001 Sep;4(9):877-86.[PubMed][Nat Neurosci]