In this July 2026 editorial, we highlight recent advances in visual system development and neuroplasticity, and explore how research on amblyopia informs our understanding of visual function, recovery, and treatment.

For over 60 years, the mammalian visual system has been a stalwart model for investigating experience-dependent brain development and plasticity. This includes seminal studies of visual deprivation (Wiesel and Hubel, 1963), critical periods (Olson and Freeman, 1980; Birch and Stager, 1996), and plasticity mechanisms (Heynen et al., 2003; Hensch, 2005), as well as contemporary investigations of neural reorganization and recovery (Echavarri-Leet et al., 2025; Birch et al., 2025; Bohnsack et al., 2026). Studies of the visual system have provided fundamental insights into how neural circuits are cultivated and impoverished by sensory experience. Research on amblyopia, a visual disorder that arises from abnormal development of neural connections, is particularly suited to expose meaningful characteristics of developmental neuroplasticity because its emergence and recovery are enabled by the pliability of neurons early in postnatal life.