Sensory Transduction

Present knowledge of the mechanisms underlying any single sensory modality is so massive as to discourage effort directed towards completeness. The idea underlying the structure of this volume on "Sensory transduction" was to select just a few topics of general interest, which are currently being investigated and for which a reasonably clear picture is now available. During the last five years there has been a revolution in the way sensory physi­ ologists think about transduction, and a series of exciting advances have been made in understanding the basic processes of photo transduction, chemotransduction and mechan­ otransduction. It is clear that in many cases the fundamental processes by which nature attains optimization of performance are similar, and that they have much in common with more general processes of signal recognition by living structures. The molecular events underlying the detection of photons by visual cells, the recognition of a given molecule by a chemoreceptor, or the level of a hormone in the extracellular fluid by a target cell, are all very similar, and involve the activation of a sequence of events leading to a secon d messenger. The 20 papers that form the present volume cover various topics in the field of sensory transduction. They originate from the lectures, seminars and discussions which made up the XVIII Course of the International School of Biophysics held in Erice, 9th - 19th June 1988. Front Matter....Pages i-xiv Front Matter....Pages 1-1 A Primer of Permeation and Gating....Pages 3-16 Interactions among Cations in Current Conduction through the Stretch-Activated Channel of the Frog Oocyte....Pages 17-22 Front Matter....Pages 23-23 Mechanoreception....Pages 25-50 Electrical Properties of the Basolateral Membrane of Hair Cells — A Review....Pages 51-63 Front Matter....Pages 65-65 The Chemistry of Chemoreception in Vertebrate Sensory Systems....Pages 67-80 Antennae and Noses: Their Sensitivities as Molecule Detectors....Pages 81-97 Molecular and Cellular Receptors in Olfaction: A Novel Model under Investigation....Pages 99-106 Front Matter....Pages 107-107 Microvillar Photoreceptor Cells of Invertebrates....Pages 109-123 The Rhodopsin-Transducin-cGMP-Phosphodiesterase Cascade of Visual Transduction....Pages 125-137 Guanylate Cyclase of Retinal Rod Outer Segment....Pages 139-145 Physical Studies of α-βγ Subunit Interactions of the Rod Outer Segment G Protein, G t : Effects of Monoclonal Antibody Binding....Pages 147-156 Comparative Effects of Phosphodiesterase Inhibitors on Detached Rod Outer Segment Function....Pages 157-167 Cation Selectivity of the cGMP-Gated Channel of Mammalian Rod Photoreceptors....Pages 169-173 The Effect of pH on the Cyclic GMP-Activated Conductance in Retinal Rods....Pages 175-181 The Cytosolic Concentration of Free Ca 2+ in Vertebrate Rod Outer Segments....Pages 183-191 Control of Intracellular Calcium in Vertebrate Photoreceptors....Pages 193-203 Light Adaptation in Retinal Rods of the Newt....Pages 205-226 Differences in Response Kinetics and Absolute Sensitivity between Red-, Blue- and Ultraviolet-Sensitive Cones of the Tiger Salamander....Pages 227-233 A Presynaptic Action of Glutamate on Cone Photoreceptors....Pages 235-245 Properties of Electrogenic Glutamate Uptake in Retinal Glia....Pages 247-256 Front Matter....Pages 107-107 The Photoresponses of the Trout Pineal Cells....Pages 257-262 Back Matter....Pages 263-271 Proceedings of a NATO ASI/18th Course of the International School of Biophysics held in Erice, Italy, June 9-19, 1988