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William H. Merigan, Jr., Ph.D.

Contact Information

Phone Numbers

Office: (585) 275-4872

Research Labs

Faculty Appointments

  • Professor - Department of Ophthalmology (SMD)
  • Professor - Center for Visual Science A&S (RC) - Joint
  • Professor - Department of Brain/Cognitive Sciences RC (RC) - Joint

Biography

Professional Background

Dr. Merigan's research examines the role of retinal ganglion cells in visual perception in the primate (human and macaque). The primate retina contains at least 14 different types of retinal ganglion cells, and each type forms a complete network across the retina. Because the size, shape and projections of each of the cell types is distinctive, it is thought that they may play quite different and possibly independent roles invisual function,but at present relatively little is known about this question. Some clues about possible functions of different ganglion cell classes comes from their structure (some extend across large swaths of retina, while others get input from tiny regions of retina), their physiology (some ganglion cells respond to color, while others are color blind), and their projections into the brain (some ganglion cells project to visual cortex while others reach the suprachiasmatic nucleus, which is thought to be important in diurnal rhythms).

Credentials

Education

1967
BA | Boston College
Psychology

1972
MS | Univ of Maryland
Psychology

1975
PhD | Univ of Maryland
Psychology, All Other

Publications

Journal Articles

9/1/2023
Godat T, Cottaris NP, Patterson S, Kohout K, Parkins K, Yang Q, Strazzeri JM, McGregor JE, Brainard DH, Merigan WH, Williams DR. "Contributed Session III: In vivo calcium imaging of macaque foveolar retinal ganglion cells reveals spatiochromatic receptive field properties." Journal of vision.. 2023 Sep 1; 23(11):32.

2022
Godat T, Cottaris NP, Patterson S, Kohout K, Parkins K, Yang Q, Strazzeri JM, McGregor JE, Brainard DH, Merigan WH, Williams DR. "In vivo chromatic and spatial tuning of foveolar retinal ganglion cells in Macaca fascicularis." PloS one.. 2022 17(11):e0278261. Epub 2022 Nov 29.

9/18/2021
McGregor JE, Kunala K, Xu Z, Murphy PJ, Godat T, Strazzeri JM, Bateman BA, Fischer WS, Parkins K, Chu CJ, Puthussery T, Williams DR, Merigan WH. "Optogenetic therapy restores retinal activity in primate for at least a year following photoreceptor ablation." Molecular therapy : the journal of the American Society of Gene Therapy.. 2021 Sep 18; Epub 2021 Sep 18.

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