Vlasits Lab

The Vlasits Lab is hiring a technician because our current technician was accepted into a PhD program!

This position combines lab management and experiments. If you are interested in gaining experience with #retina research in Chicago, please apply.

vlasitslab.org

uic.csod.com/ux/ats/caree...

To bridge the gap to translation, we developed an RP model in adult human retinal explants and show that both gene therapies protect photoreceptors, highlighting their therapeutic promise as mutation-agnostic strategies against proteotoxicity. authors.elsevier.com/a/1mvXe3BtfH...

New study led by Ning Shen w/ @phruzycki.bsky.social: a genome-wide in vivo CRISPR screen in a retinitis pigmentosa mouse model identifies genes whose loss accelerates photoreceptor death. Overexpressing two, UFD1 and UXT, preserves photoreceptors, retinal function, and vision. 🧵

New paper out in @cp-neuron.bsky.social 🎉

What determines contextual modulation in V1? Why does the visual surround sometimes facilitate and sometimes suppress a neuron's response to its preferred stimulus?

Posting on behalf of (soon-to-be) Dr. Samira Monshietehadi (not on Bluesky) -- "I’m very excited to announce that my PhD thesis project is now a preprint! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6.... We show how Müller glia engage with growing retina vasculature in an activity-independent manner."(1/11)

I’m very excited to announce that a part of my PhD thesis project is now a preprint! In this paper, we show how spontaneous activity prior to visual experience shapes neural circuits in the retina. (1/11)

Studying vision across light levels? Interested in rod photoreceptors and related (patho)physiology? Matteo Rizzi, Kate Powell and I wrote a review on rod photoreceptor activity at daylight doi.org/10.1016/j.vi... . Free access link here kwnsfk27.r.eu-west-1.awstrack.me/L0/https:%2F...

Nonlinear spatial integration allows the retina to detect the sign of defocus in natural scenes The retina can easily detect whether the eye is too small or too big thanks to the imperfections of the eye optics.

Happy to share my first work with a connection to myopia, a collaboration with EssilorLuxottica
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Zebrafish use spectral information to suppress the visual background Vertebrate eyes first evolved in water, where spectral content rapidly fades with distance. Zebrafish exploit this loss by antagonizing cone signals to suppress the background, pointing to distance es...

Excited to share our paper now published in Cell!
'Zebrafish use spectral information to suppress the visual background'

Huge thanks to @neurofishh.bsky.social & @teuler.bsky.social

@cellpress.bsky.social @cp-cell.bsky.social

👇🏻
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

We’re hiring! Join the Sivyer Lab at The University of Sydney as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Neurodegeneration within the Snow Vision Accelerator, a $50M initiative tackling glaucoma and optic nerve disease. iPSCs, electrophysiology, drug discovery, and gene therapy.

Our work on the TET enzymes in retinal development is out. We identified that rod fate is inhibited when DNA demethylation is prevented by removal of the TET enzymes. Interestingly, photoreceptor numbers are normal. We utilized WGBS and bACE-seq to profile the precise localization of 5mC and 5hmC,…

Excited to see this out! 🎉 Congratulations to the fantastic
@nkkuhn.bsky.social for leading the way, with key contributions from Chen Li and
@boninlab.bsky.social. Thanks also to: @nerflabs.bsky.social, @fwovlaanderen.bsky.social, @viblifesciences.bsky.social, and KU Leuven.
tinyurl.com/3rfe6f2k

Ambient Light Impacts Innate Behaviors of New-World and Old-World Mice Animals encounter predators and prey under diverse lighting conditions that signal different risks and opportunities, yet how ambient illumination shapes innate approach and avoidance behaviors remain...

New paper on bioRxiv: "Ambient Light Impacts Innate Behaviors of New-World and Old-World Mice" - together with @farrowlab.bsky.social, with data from NERF master students and two of my lab members! A study across 3 species: Mus musculus, Peromyscus maniculatus & P. polionotus doi.org/10.1101/2025...

Our proposal for a ‘universal’ nomenclature for rod and cone types based on their evolutionary lineages that will equally apply to all vertebrate species is now out! Have a look and please consider adopting the system :)

Molecular mechanism establishing the OFF pathway in vision Nature Communications - LRFN2 in cone photoreceptors is vital for building the OFF pathway. Here authors report this cell-adhesion molecule stabilizes contacts with OFF bipolar cells, clusters...

The ON/OFF dichotomy is fundamental to visual processing. In a new study led by Flori Soto, we identify a conserved molecular mechanism establishing the OFF pathway. rdcu.be/eikoa

Connectome-driven neural inventory of a complete visual system - Nature A connectome of the right optic lobe from a male fruitfly is presented together with an extensive collection of genetic drivers matched to a comprehensive neuron-type catalogue.

I know there's a 𝒍𝒐𝒕 going on right now, but I couldn’t be prouder to share this long-incubated labor of love: the complete connectome of the male 𝐷𝑟𝑜𝑠𝑜𝑝ℎ𝑖𝑙𝑎 optic lobe 🧠🪰
🔗 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The unbearable slowness of being: Humans still clock in at just 10 bits/s. Even after peer review :) Share link: authors.elsevier.com/a/1kHVa3BtfH.... ArXiv: arxiv.org/abs/2408.10234

Our paper on MouseGoggles - an open-source mini VR headset for mice - just came out! Really excited about finally integrating eye-tracking into the headset. Nice working with you @hongyuchang.bsky.social!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
github.com/sn-lab/Mouse...
#neuroskyence

Daily glucocorticoids promote glioblastoma growth and circadian synchrony to the host Gonzalez-Aponte et al. identify daily glucocorticoid receptor signaling as an intrinsic driver of glioblastoma (GBM) progression and a synchronizer of tumor clock gene expression to the host. This work provides an intrinsic circadian driver, and therapeutic target, to slow GBM growth, and offers considerations for glucocorticoid use in the clinic.

Excited to share our latest article! We find that the brain tumor Glioblastoma has a circadian clock that syncs with its host’s environment. These tumors also hijack the circadian clock and use daily signals, like glucocorticoids, to grow 🧠⏱️ @erikherzog.bsky.social
More: www.cell.com/cancer-cell/...

Light modulates glucose and lipid homeostasis via the sympathetic nervous system Light exerts circadian-independent effects on glucose and lipid metabolism.

Happy for this paper to be out on direct circadian-independent effects of light on glucose and lipid metabolism. Spearheaded by student, Xiangning Chen, and in collaboration with Haiqing Zhao and @samerhattar.bsky.social

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Nonlinear receptive fields evoke redundant retinal coding of natural scenes - Nature Species-specific gaze shifts with natural stimuli drive correlated spiking in retinal ganglion cells.

How natural stimuli lead to highly correlated ganglion cell activity in primate (marmoset) and mouse retina. Now out in @natureportfolio.bsky.social. And, I guess, great opportunity for a first post on this site. #FirstSkeet Very brief summary in this thread. 1/

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

New @bioRxiv #preprint with @chiarafornetto.bsky.social and @teuler.bsky.social : www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Identification of a non-canonical planar cell polarity pathway triggered by light in the developing mouse retina Housset et al. show that basal bodies of cone photoreceptors in the mouse retina are planar polarized in a light-dependent manner by the action of transducin and G-protein-signaling modulator protein ...

Our latest work is out!! Short thread below.

www.cell.com/developmenta...

Wireless recordings from dragonfly target detecting neurons
during prey interception flight. Interestingly, the classic target detector neurons (TSDNs) appear to control foveating head movements during flight, not prey capture.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...