Click here to close
Hello! We notice that you are using Internet Explorer, which is not supported by Xenbase and may cause the site to display incorrectly.
We suggest using a current version of Chrome,
FireFox, or Safari.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A
2017 May 23;11421:5437-5442. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1620010114.
Show Gene links
Show Anatomy links
Adaptation of cone pigments found in green rods for scotopic vision through a single amino acid mutation.
Kojima K
,
Matsutani Y
,
Yamashita T
,
Yanagawa M
,
Imamoto Y
,
Yamano Y
,
Wada A
,
Hisatomi O
,
Nishikawa K
,
Sakurai K
,
Shichida Y
.
???displayArticle.abstract???
Most vertebrate retinas contain a single type of rod for scotopic vision and multiple types of cones for photopic and color vision. The retinas of certain amphibian species uniquely contain two types of rods: red rods, which express rhodopsin, and green rods, which express a blue-sensitive cone pigment (M1/SWS2 group). Spontaneous activation of rhodopsin induced by thermal isomerization of the retinal chromophore has been suggested to contribute to the rod's background noise, which limits the visual threshold for scotopic vision. Therefore, rhodopsin must exhibit low thermal isomerization rate compared with cone visual pigments to adapt to scotopic condition. In this study, we determined whether amphibian blue-sensitive cone pigments in green rods exhibit low thermal isomerization rates to act as rhodopsin-like pigments for scotopic vision. Anura blue-sensitive cone pigments exhibit low thermal isomerization rates similar to rhodopsin, whereas Urodela pigments exhibit high rates like other vertebrate cone pigments present in cones. Furthermore, by mutational analysis, we identified a key amino acid residue, Thr47, that is responsible for the low thermal isomerization rates of Anura blue-sensitive cone pigments. These results strongly suggest that, through this mutation, anurans acquired special blue-sensitive cone pigments in their green rods, which could form the molecular basis for scotopic color vision with normal red rods containing green-sensitive rhodopsin.
Aho,
Low retinal noise in animals with low body temperature allows high visual sensitivity.
1988, Pubmed
Aho,
Low retinal noise in animals with low body temperature allows high visual sensitivity.
1988,
Pubmed
Ala-Laurila,
Chromophore switch from 11-cis-dehydroretinal (A2) to 11-cis-retinal (A1) decreases dark noise in salamander red rods.
2007,
Pubmed
Ala-Laurila,
Thermal activation and photoactivation of visual pigments.
2004,
Pubmed
Anderson,
A stem batrachian from the Early Permian of Texas and the origin of frogs and salamanders.
2008,
Pubmed
Bäckström,
Receptive field organization of ganglion cells in the frog retina: contributions from cones, green rods and red rods.
1975,
Pubmed
Baylor,
Two components of electrical dark noise in toad retinal rod outer segments.
1980,
Pubmed
Field,
Nonlinear signal transfer from mouse rods to bipolar cells and implications for visual sensitivity.
2002,
Pubmed
Field,
Retinal processing near absolute threshold: from behavior to mechanism.
2005,
Pubmed
Fu,
Quantal noise from human red cone pigment.
2008,
Pubmed
Fu,
Phototransduction in mouse rods and cones.
2007,
Pubmed
Gniubkin,
[Contancy of color perception in the grey toad].
1975,
Pubmed
Govardovskii,
Why do green rods of frog and toad retinas look green?
2014,
Pubmed
Hecht,
ENERGY, QUANTA, AND VISION.
1942,
Pubmed
Hisatomi,
Primary structure of a visual pigment in bullfrog green rods.
1999,
Pubmed
Imamoto,
Efficiencies of activation of transducin by cone and rod visual pigments.
2013,
Pubmed
Kefalov,
Role of visual pigment properties in rod and cone phototransduction.
2003,
Pubmed
,
Xenbase
Kicliter,
Spectral opponency of on-type ganglion cells and the blue preference of Rana pipiens.
1981,
Pubmed
Kojima,
Rod visual pigment optimizes active state to achieve efficient G protein activation as compared with cone visual pigments.
2014,
Pubmed
Lórenz-Fonfría,
Protein fluctuations as the possible origin of the thermal activation of rod photoreceptors in the dark.
2010,
Pubmed
Luo,
Activation of visual pigments by light and heat.
2011,
Pubmed
Ma,
A visual pigment expressed in both rod and cone photoreceptors.
2001,
Pubmed
Matsuyama,
Covalent bond between ligand and receptor required for efficient activation in rhodopsin.
2010,
Pubmed
Matthews,
Dark noise in the outer segment membrane current of green rod photoreceptors from toad retina.
1984,
Pubmed
Maximov,
Chromatic properties of the retinal afferents in the thalamus and the tectum of the frog (Rana temporaria).
1985,
Pubmed
Mohun,
Identification and characterization of visual pigments in caecilians (Amphibia: Gymnophiona), an order of limbless vertebrates with rudimentary eyes.
2010,
Pubmed
Naarendorp,
Dark light, rod saturation, and the absolute and incremental sensitivity of mouse cone vision.
2010,
Pubmed
NILSSON,
RECEPTOR CELL OUTER SEGMENT DEVELOPMENT AND ULTRASTRUCTURE OF THE DISK MEMBRANES IN THE RETINA OF THE TADPOLE (RANA PIPIENS).
1964,
Pubmed
Okada,
The retinal conformation and its environment in rhodopsin in light of a new 2.2 A crystal structure.
2004,
Pubmed
Oprian,
Expression of a synthetic bovine rhodopsin gene in monkey kidney cells.
1987,
Pubmed
Pahlberg,
Visual threshold is set by linear and nonlinear mechanisms in the retina that mitigate noise: how neural circuits in the retina improve the signal-to-noise ratio of the single-photon response.
2011,
Pubmed
Piechnick,
Effect of channel mutations on the uptake and release of the retinal ligand in opsin.
2012,
Pubmed
Pyron,
A large-scale phylogeny of Amphibia including over 2800 species, and a revised classification of extant frogs, salamanders, and caecilians.
2011,
Pubmed
Reuter,
Border and colour coding in the retina of the frog.
1972,
Pubmed
Rieke,
Origin and functional impact of dark noise in retinal cones.
2000,
Pubmed
Sakurai,
Physiological properties of rod photoreceptor cells in green-sensitive cone pigment knock-in mice.
2007,
Pubmed
Sherry,
Identification and distribution of photoreceptor subtypes in the neotenic tiger salamander retina.
1998,
Pubmed
Takahashi,
Distribution of blue-sensitive photoreceptors in amphibian retinas.
2001,
Pubmed
Yanagawa,
Origin of the low thermal isomerization rate of rhodopsin chromophore.
2015,
Pubmed
Yau,
Thermal activation of the visual transduction mechanism in retinal rods.
1979,
Pubmed
Yue,
Spontaneous activation of visual pigments in relation to openness/closedness of chromophore-binding pocket.
2017,
Pubmed
