THE DIFFERENCES IN THE EXPRESSIONS OF VISUAL PIGMENTS AND TRANSDUCIN IN PHOTORECEPTOR CELL-DIFFERENTIATION

The distribution and accumulation of visual pigments, i.e., rod pigmen t, rhodopsin and red sensitive cone pigment, iodopsin, and transducin in the retina of chicken and chicken embryo were investigated immunohi stochemically using their specific antibodies. The immunoreactivities of these proteins appeared at the early stage of photoreceptor differe ntiation (embryonal day 15) and increased in the photoreceptor cells a ppeared to reach maximum at the end of the embryonal period (embryonal day 20). On the other hand, although the immunoreactivity of beta gam ma subunit of transducin (T beta gamma) was detected at embryonal day 15, the expression level of T beta gamma still remained in low level d uring the embryonal period. These observations suggest that both T bet a gamma and visual pigments are expressed during the embryonic period in chicken photoreceptor cells, but their accumulations in the cells a re different.