Cone photoreceptor ablation in microglia-deficient larval zebrafish retina elicits a regenerative response alongside a compensatory immune cell response

Jordan E. Rumford, Ashley A. Farre, Justin Mai, Halle V. Weimar, Claire D. Shelton, Michael Morales, Diana M. Mitchell · 2026

Read Cone photoreceptor ablation in microglia-deficient larval zebrafish retina elicits a regenerative response alongside a compensatory immune cell response by Jordan E. Rumford, Ashley A. Farre, Justin Mai, Halle V. Weimar, Claire D. Shelton, Michael Morales, Diana M. Mitchell (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/PMC13395315.txt.

Description

Jordan E. Rumford and colleagues ask, in 2026, whether immune cells named microglia are needed for eye repair in zebrafish. Fish regrow light-sensing cone cells after harm, while mammals mostly cannot. The team compared normal fish larvae with mutants that lack microglia. They killed cone cells and watched support cells divide and rebuild.

Rebuilding of cones went ahead much the same without microglia. Division of the support-cell pool dipped only modestly at some stages. A spare set of immune cells still showed up in mutant eyes after harm, though in smaller counts. Those stand-ins blur firm claims about microglia. The authors say backup responses may mask what microglia truly do.

Catalog record

CREATORJordan E. Rumford, Ashley A. Farre, Justin Mai, Halle V. Weimar, Claire D. Shelton, Michael Morales, Diana M. Mitchell
YEAR2026
COLLECTIONPAPERS
FORMATTXT
FILE SIZE84976
LICENSEhttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
RIGHTSCC BY
SOURCEEurope PMC

Source: https://europepmc.org/article/MED/PMC13395315

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