retinal cone

one of the two types of visual cells, along with retinal rods, having synapses internally with bipolar retinal cells. Cones serve light and color vision and visual acuity. Their synaptic terminals are broad, flattened pedicles. Those outside the fovea centralis have dendritic inner segments that are relatively short and squat with blunt, rounded tips; those within the fovea centralis have inner segments that are more elongated and narrow, so that these cones resemble rods. There are 6 million to 7 million cones, of which about 10 per cent are concentrated in the fovea centralis and the remainder are distributed fairly uniformly over the rest of the retina. Called also cone and cone cell.