Organisms of all domains of life use photoreceptor proteins to sense and respond to light.
The light-sensitivity of photoreceptor proteins arises from bound chromophores such as …

BACKGROUND Channelrhodopsins (ChRs) are naturally occurring light-gated ion channels
that are important for allowing motile algal cells to find suitable light levels. In neuroscience …

Optogenetic tools enable examination of how specific cell types contribute to brain circuit
functions. A long-standing question is whether it is possible to independently activate two …

Channelrhodopsins (ChRs) are used to optogenetically depolarize neurons. We engineered
a variant of ChR, denoted red-activatable ChR (ReaChR), that is optimally excited with …

Diverse optogenetic tools have allowed versatile control over neural activity. Many
depolarizing and hyperpolarizing tools have now been developed in multiple laboratories …

The capture and utilization of light is an exquisitely evolved process. The single-component
microbial opsins, although more limited than multicomponent cascades in processing …

The possibility offered by photocontrolling the activity of biomolecules in vivo while recording
physiological parameters is opening up new opportunities for the study of physiological …

Channelrhodopsins (ChRs) are directly light-gated ion channels that function as sensory
photoreceptors in flagellated green algae, allowing these algae to identify optimal light …

In order to understand how the brain generates behaviors, it is important to be able to
determine how neural circuits work together to perform computations. Because neural …

We have used protein engineering to expand the palette of genetically encoded calcium ion
(Ca2+) indicators to include orange and improved red fluorescent variants, and validated the …