In an investigation by Shelley et al. (2009), retinal synaptic changes were noted in human ARMD tissue, where aberrant distribution of immunoreactivity for vGluT1 was noted in the cone axon and pedicle in ARMD, while vGluT1 transporter was normally confined to the presynaptic terminal. The gene discussed is SLC17A7; the disease is age-related macular degeneration.