Suva Roy
Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology-Research
Retinal circuits and computations
Neurobiology of disease
Comparative biology of vision
Cellular and systems neuroscience
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Research:
The Roy lab takes an interdisciplinary approach for studying molecular and neural circuit mechanisms underlying visual feature detection in the retina, in healthy and diseased conditions.
Adaptive computations in the retina
Adaptation to light is salient for our vision. This phenomenon occurs at various stages of retinal processing, eventually altering our sensitivity to ambient light. A key regulator of retinal light adaptation is dopamine, which acts as a paracrine agent, modulating signals in well-defined retinal circuits. Dysfunction of dopaminergic signaling has been associated with blinding retinal diseases and neuropsychiatric diseases. Leveraging genetic, electrophysiological, imaging, and computational tools, we aim to provide a comprehensive assessment of dopamine’s impact on retinal circuit functions and visual deficits that arise from dysfunctions of dopamine signaling.
Visual signaling between the retina and the brain
Visual specializations can vary dramatically across species. For example, rodents are specialized for dim light vision, while humans are specialized for bright light high acuity vision. This divergence is thought to arise from fundamental differences in the architecture of the primary visual pathways. Tree shrew presents itself as a phylogenetic link, providing an opportunity to study how cone dominated, high acuity, chromatic vision, guide sophisticated behaviors in higher mammals. In this NIH funded project, we are using viral tracing, large-scale electrophysiology and optogenetics to examine diversity of retinal ganglion cell types and their projection patterns to higher brain areas that guide behaviors.
Other ongoing work
Other ongoing (collaborative) projects in the lab include studying (1) the structural and functional connections in retinal interneuron circuits in the context of feature encoding, and (2) the molecular mechanisms underlying altered signaling in retinal neurons in glaucoma. The lab is also invested in developing tools such as light-sheet microscopy, computational modeling, and spike-sorting algorithms, for vision research.