Experience-dependent plasticity in the lateral geniculate nucleus

Abstract

Experience-dependent plasticity in the visual system is traditionally thought to be exclusively cortical whereas the dorsal lateral geniculate nucleus (dLGN) is classically considered to just be a ‘relay’ of visual information between the retina and the cortex. However, a number of recent experiments call into question the simplistic view of visual cortex being the only site of plasticity. Thalamic neurons, at least in mouse dLGN, combine inputs from ganglion cells located in both eyes and recent evidence suggests that the feature selectivity of dLGN neurons is subject to experience-dependent plasticity. Here we discuss new insights into the nature of thalamic visual processing, focusing on the unexpected degree and plasticity of functional binocular convergence in mouse dLGN.