Lawrence Sincich, Ph.D.Lawrence Sincich, Ph.D., professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Optometry was awarded a $2.1 million R01 grant to support a pioneering four-year research project titled “Elementary Cone Photoreceptor Representation in Primary Visual Cortex” by the National Eye Institute.
The study aims to uncover how the brain interprets visual signals from individual cone photoreceptors, cells that convert light into electrical signals to enable vision. Using state-of-the-art adaptive optics technology, the research team will observe how neurons in the brain’s primary visual cortex respond to both clear and impaired visual input.
“We are studying how individual brain cells in the first part of the brain that processes vision respond to images when we remove natural blurriness,” Sincich said. “Each of these brain cells is tuned to certain visual patterns, and we want to see exactly what those patterns look like when the image is clear, and which specific light-sensing cells in the eye are involved.”
The research has implications for understanding how the brain compensates for vision loss caused by diseases such as glaucoma and age-related macular degeneration.
“By measuring how these neurons react to normal versus degraded stimuli, we will learn the degree to which they are resilient to retinal degeneration,” Sincich said. “Knowing the answer is important for understanding why patients with eye problems often fail to notice they are missing some vision.”
The project’s goals are to map neural responses from single neurons under normal conditions, to observe how those responses change with simulated vision loss and to determine how visual information is passed to higher cortical areas involved in perception.
“My hope is that understanding how these neurons behave when visual signals start to disappear from the retina will let us design better vision testing for early diagnosis,” Sincich said. “That’s really needed to help save vision in patients.”
The grant will fund the development of specialized optical instruments, support extensive physiological data analysis and provide training for emerging scientists, including those who already hold Doctor of Optometry degrees.