Journal of anatomy
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One day old rats had their right eyes removed and together with non-enucleated controls were raised in either 'light' or 'dark' (red light) conditions from birth until 39 days of age. This resulted in four groups of animals: light-reared enucleated, light-reared non-enucleated, dark-reared enucleated and dark-reared non-enucleated. All animals were killed by intracardiac perfusion with 2.5% sodium cacodylate-buffered glutaraldehyde at 39 days of age. ⋯ However, there was a suggestion of a differential effect between the right and left cortices in these enucleated, dark-reared animals. These results demonstrate the importance of light stimulation for the normal development of interneuronal connectivity of the visual cortex. They also show that the effects of unilateral enucleation for the visual cortex are not as great as those previously observed for the superior colliculi in the same animals, at least as far as synapse-to-neuron ratios are concerned.