This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. The goal is to obtain three-dimensional images of photoreceptor cells and their internal structures from wildtype retinas and from retinas of mice with mutations corresponding to human retinal disease. Understanding these structures will help us to understand the normal structure of healthy photoreceptors, and the structural correlates of disease pathogenesis. The most interesting structures will be the disk membranes, flattened membrane sacks which fill up the photoreceptor outer segments. These are packed with rhodopsin at high density and the organization of rhodopsin in these membranes is a subject of considerable controversy. Disorganization of these membranes is observed in a number of mouse models of human retinal degeneration. We hope to see the structural organization of these membranes and their connections to cytoskeletal elements and the plasma membrane. These have been previously observed only in samples that have been sectioned and negatively stained, or subjected to freeze-etch procedures. Cryo-electron tomography offers the opportunity to observe these in intact cells (at least on the margins of the cell) with no manipulations other than rapid freezing. Also of interest will be the connecting cilium, a bundle of microtubules that connects the inner and outer segments and serves to transport outer segment components to their proper location. Defects in genes involved in the structure and function of this cilium and the trans-cilium transport also lead to retinal degeneration.
| Bucero, Marta Abril; Bajaj, Chandrajit; Mourrain, Bernard (2016) On the construction of general cubature formula by flat extensions. Linear Algebra Appl 502:104-125 |
| Ebeida, Mohamed S; Rushdi, Ahmad A; Awad, Muhammad A et al. (2016) Disk Density Tuning of a Maximal Random Packing. Comput Graph Forum 35:259-269 |
| Wensel, Theodore G; Zhang, Zhixian; Anastassov, Ivan A et al. (2016) Structural and molecular bases of rod photoreceptor morphogenesis and disease. Prog Retin Eye Res 55:32-51 |
| Baker, Mariah R; Fan, Guizhen; Serysheva, Irina I (2015) Single-Particle Cryo-EM of the Ryanodine Receptor Channel in an Aqueous Environment. Eur J Transl Myol 25:4803 |
| Rushdi, Ahmad A; Mitchell, Scott A; Bajaj, Chandrajit L et al. (2015) Robust All-quad Meshing of Domains with Connected Regions. Procedia Eng 124:96-108 |
| Edwards, John; Daniel, Eric; Pascucci, Valerio et al. (2015) Approximating the Generalized Voronoi Diagram of Closely Spaced Objects. Comput Graph Forum 34:299-309 |
| Wensel, Theodore G; Gilliam, Jared C (2015) Three-dimensional architecture of murine rod cilium revealed by cryo-EM. Methods Mol Biol 1271:267-92 |
| Jeter, Cameron B; Patel, Saumil S; Morris, Jeffrey S et al. (2015) Oculomotor executive function abnormalities with increased tic severity in Tourette syndrome. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 56:193-202 |
| Zhang, Qin; Cha, Deukhyun; Bajaj, Chandrajit (2015) Quality Partitioned Meshing of Multi-Material Objects. Procedia Eng 124:187-199 |
| Baker, Mariah R; Fan, Guizhen; Serysheva, Irina I (2015) Single-particle cryo-EM of the ryanodine receptor channel in an aqueous environment. Eur J Transl Myol 25:35-48 |
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