Fig. 4

Early PrPSc accumulation associated with cone photoreceptor damage. a Uninfected retina shows normal cone morphology and distribution of cone opsin (green) in outer segment. b At 104 dpi early PrPSc deposits are associated with cone inner segments (arrow) and some PrPSc appears to localize with cone opsin (white areas in × 2 magnified inset). c At 118 dpi, a swollen, dystrophic cone with PrPSc is seen (yellow box) and some PrPSc is also present in rods (blue arrow). d Serial confocal sections spaced 0.5 µm apart, magnify the swollen cone inner segment from c and suggests the PrPSc is inside the inner segment along with mistrafficked cone opsin. Scale bar in a and c = 5 µm. Scale bar in d series = 2 µm. a–c are confocal z-stacks