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Annual Review of Biophysics

Volume 52, 2023

Mechanism of Activation of the Visual Receptor Rhodopsin

Abstract

Rhodopsin is the photoreceptor in human rod cells responsible for dim-light vision. The visual receptors are part of the large superfamily of G protein–coupled receptors (GPCRs) that mediate signal transduction in response to diverse diffusible ligands. The high level of sequence conservation within the transmembrane helices of the visual receptors and the family A GPCRs has long been considered evidence for a common pathway for signal transduction. I review recent studies that reveal a comprehensive mechanism for how light absorption by the retinylidene chromophore drives rhodopsin activation and highlight those features of the mechanism that are conserved across the ligand-activated GPCRs.

Keyword(s): G protein–coupled receptor, GPCR, mechanism, rhodopsin, structure, vision
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2023-05-09
2024-05-06
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Mechanism of Activation of the Visual Receptor Rhodopsin
Annual Review of Biophysics 52, 301 (2023); https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-biophys-083122-094909
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-biophys-083122-094909
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-biophys-083122-094909
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