VISION SCIENCE RESEARCH SEMINAR 2023-2024: THE STRUCTURE AND DYNAMICS OF PHOTORECEPTOR CALYCEAL PROCESSES
Dr. Jennifer Hocking Associate Professor University of Alberta College of Health Sciences Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry
Abstract:
Vertebrate photoreceptors detect light through their outer segment, a modified primary cilium filled with photopigment-laden membranous discs. Surrounding the base of the outer segment are calyceal processes (CPs), microvilli-like protrusions with an actin core. While CP disruption is associated with altered outer segment morphology and loss of vision, our knowledge of CP structure and functions remains elusive. My lab has been characterizing CPs in the zebrafish retina. In the seminar, I will discuss the variations in CPs between photoreceptor subtypes, their stability across light- and dark-adapted conditions despite retinomotor movements and continuous actin turnover, the relationship between CPs and the emerging outer segment, and interactions with neighboring cell types. Our results suggest the photoreceptor outer segment is surrounded by an elaborate network of support structures
Biography:
Following an undergraduate degree in Biomedical Toxicology at the University of Guelph, Jen completed a PhD in neuroscience under the supervision of Dr. Sarah McFarlane at the University of Calgary. Her project evaluated the signaling factors directing the growth of retinal ganglion cell axons and dendrites in the Xenopus laevis model. She subsequently switched to zebrafish research by joining the neuroimaging lab of Dr. Reinhard Koester at the Helmholtz Institute in Munich, Germany, where she studied the migration of cerebellar neurons. Returning to the eye, she completed a second postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Andrew Waskiewicz at the University of Alberta, characterizing the developmental basis of a novel ocular disease, superior coloboma. Her own lab, started in 2015 in the Division of Anatomy at the University of Alberta, focuses on the development and maintenance of photoreceptor morphology