Dr. Barbara Battelle Published Invited Review in Biological Bulletin’s Virtual Symposium: New Insights from Genetic Data Sets on the Function and Evolution of Visual Systems

Dr. Barbara Battelle Published Invited Review in Biological Bulletin’s Virtual Symposium: New Insights from Genetic Data Sets on the Function and Evolution of Visual Systems

Published: Monday, December 18, 2017

Whitney Lab Emeritus Professor of Neuroscience Barbara Battelle published an invited review in the Biological Bulletin’s Virtual Symposium: New Insights from Genetic Data Sets on the Function and Evolution of Visual Systems. Dr. Battelle’s review, titled “Opsins and Their Expression Patterns in the Xiphosuran Limulus polyphemus,” describes some of the work she and her students and collaborators have done on the visual pigments (opsins) expressed in the American horseshoe crab – from their genes to changes in the circadian expression of their proteins. Beginning in the 1930s, the American horseshoe crab has been a favorite model for vision scientists studying photoreceptor functions because its photoreceptors are large and because horseshoe crabs occupy a unique position in the arthropod family tree. By applying new techniques of biochemistry, cell biology, molecular biology and genomics, Dr. Battelle’s studies have revealed unexpected complexities in the horseshoe crab’s visual system that have provided new insights into photoreceptor functions and how these functions are modulated by light and circadian rhythms as well as the evolution of arthropod visual systems.

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