We measured mosaic properties of midget and parasol ganglion cells in
the retina of a New World monkey, the common marmoset Callithrix
jacchus. We addressed the functional specialization of these
populations for color and spatial vision, by comparing the mosaic of
ganglion cells in dichromatic (“red–green color blind”)
and trichromatic marmosets. Ganglion cells were labelled by photolytic
amplification of retrograde marker (“photofilling”) following
injections into the lateral geniculate nucleus, or by intracellular
injection in an in vitro retinal preparation. The dendritic-field
size, shape, and overlap of neighboring cells were measured. We show that
in marmosets, both midget and parasol cells exhibit a radial bias, so that
the long axis of the dendritic field points towards the fovea. The radial
bias is similar for parasol cells and midget cells, despite the fact that
midget cell dendritic fields are more elongated than are those of parasol
cells. The dendritic fields of midget ganglion cells from the same (ON or
OFF) response-type array show very little overlap, consistent with the low
coverage of the midget mosaic in humans. No large differences in radial
bias, or overlap, were seen on comparing retinae from dichromatic and
trichromatic animals. These data suggest that radial bias in ganglion cell
populations is a consistent feature of the primate retina. Furthermore,
they suggest that the mosaic properties of the midget cell population are
associated with high spatial resolution rather than being specifically
associated with trichromatic color vision.