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Biotech News Science news Regular science news |
Blind cells see the light
November 20 – A team lead by Neurobiologist Richard Kramer at the University of California, Berkeley, have inserted a light activating switch into brain cells normally insensitive to light. The cells were engineered to contain a mutated potassium ion channel that, when bound with a light sensitive azobenzene compound called a photoswitch, closes when exposed to green wavelength light and opens in response to ultraviolet light. The potassium channels may also be made sensitive to molecules instead of light, so that a nerve cell could be turned on or off by DNA or heavy metals. The team will apply its method for making light-regulated channels in the living eye to control retinal ganglion function responsible for signal regulation to the brain.
[Source: University of California, Berkeley]
