PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
ED  - , 
TI  - Seeing Is Believing
AID  - 10.1126/stke.3462006tw261
DP  - 2006 Aug 01
TA  - Science's STKE
PG  - tw261--tw261
VI  - 2006
IP  - 346
4099  - http://stke.sciencemag.org/content/2006/346/tw261.short
4100  - http://stke.sciencemag.org/content/2006/346/tw261.full
SO  - Sci. STKE2006 Aug 01; 2006
AB  - In order for vertebrate photoreceptors to exhibit their exquisite sensitivity that allows them to distinguish stimulation by a single photon, the sensor, rhodopsin, must have a very reproducible response. Rhodopsin propagates the signal from absorbed photons by activating transducin, but it is then inactivated by phosphorylation. Doan et al. measured the response of single rhodopsin molecules to single-photon absorption events in preparations of mouse photoreceptors. Multiple phosphorylation events provide independent inhibitory signals that together may provide the remarkable reproducibility of the amplitude and duration of rhodopsin activation observed in the vertebrate eye. T. Doan, A. Mendez, P. B. Detwiler, J. Chen, F. Rieke, Multiple phosphorylation sites confer reproducibility of the rod's single-photon responses. Science 313, 530-533 (2006). [Abstract] [Full Text]