Inner retinal circadian clocks and non-visual photoreceptors: novel players in the circadian system.

GUIDO ME.; GARBARINO PICO E.; CONTÍN MA.; VALDEZ DJ.; NIETO PS.; VERRA DM.; ACOSTA-RODRÍGUEZ VA.; DE ZAVALÍA N.; ROSENSTEIN RE.

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD

Año: 2010 vol. 92 p. 484 - 484

Inner retinal circadian clocks and non-visual photoreceptors: novel players in the circadian system.Daily and annual changes in ambient illumination serve as specific stimuli that associate light with time and regulate the physiology of the organism through the eye. The eye acts as a dual sense organ linking light and vision, and detecting light that provides specific stimuli for nonclassical photoreceptors located in the inner retina. These photoreceptors convey information to the master circadian pacemaker, the hypothalamic suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN). Responsible for sensing the light that regulates several non-visual functions (i.e. behavior, pupil reflex, sleep, and pineal melatonin production), the retina plays a key role in the temporal symphony orchestra playing the musical score of life: it is intrinsically rhythmic in its physiological and metabolicactivities. We discuss here recent evidence in support of the hypothesis that retinal oscillators