Retinal Degeneration News and Research

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Retinal tissue may degenerate for a number of reasons. Among them are: artery or vein occlusion, diabetic retinopathy, R.L.F./R.O.P. or disease (usually hereditary). Retinitis pigmentosa, retinoschisis, lattic degeneration, and macular degeneration are characterized by progressive types of retinal degeneration.

HIV drugs could be harnessed to treat leading cause of blindness

An established class of drugs, traditionally used to control HIV/AIDS infections, could soon be harnessed to treat the leading cause of blindness and visual impairment in the UK, for which currently there exists no cure.

27 Nov 2014

University at Buffalo researchers receive $500,000 grant to study IED-induced vision loss

It's well known that battlefield explosions can cause hearing loss, but veterans may be surprised to learn that their vision may also suffer — sometimes weeks or months after combat exposure.

14 Nov 2014

Prosthetic retina could help counter the effects of AMD and related vision disorders

The loss of eyesight, often caused by retinal degeneration, is a life-altering health issue for many people, especially as they age.

13 Nov 2014

Study on blind cave fish could reveal mechanisms behind eye disease, other human ailments

Blind cave fish may not be the first thing that comes to mind when it comes to understanding human sight, but recent research indicates they may have quite a bit to teach us about the causes of many human ailments, including those that result in loss of sight.

20 Oct 2014

Finding suggests that retina acts as type of window to the brain

Researchers at the Gladstone Institutes and University of California, San Francisco have shown that a loss of cells in the retina is one of the earliest signs of frontotemporal dementia (FTD) in people with a genetic risk for the disorder-even before any changes appear in their behavior.

25 Aug 2014

Ocugen's OCU100 gets FDA orphan drug designation for treatment of retinitis pigmentosa

Ocugen, Inc. and the University of Colorado today announced exclusive license agreements that allow for Ocugen to continue developing two drug candidates for the treatment for ophthalmology indications, and that one of the assets, OCU100, recombinant lens epithelium derived growth factor 1-326 (LEDGF1-326), received orphan-drug status from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for treatment of retinitis pigmentosa (RP), a rare eye disease.

6 Jun 2014

Regular grape consumption may play role in eye health

New research presented this week at the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology conference in Orlando, Florida suggests that regular grape consumption may play a role in eye health by protecting the retina from deterioration.

30 May 2014

Professor receives $1M grant for biomedical imaging using bioluminescent gene reporters, MRI

The W.M. Keck Foundation's Medical Research Program has presented a grant for $1 million to Angelique Louie, a professor and vice chair of the UC Davis Department of Biomedical Engineering.

11 Mar 2014

Moderate aerobic exercise helps preserve nerve cells in retina after damage

Moderate aerobic exercise helps to preserve the structure and function of nerve cells in the retina after damage, according to an animal study appearing February 12 in The Journal of Neuroscience. The findings suggest exercise may be able to slow the progression of retinal degenerative diseases.

9 Feb 2014

Gene therapies correct three forms of retinal degenerative diseases

Gene therapies developed by University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine researchers have worked to correct different forms of blindness. While effective, the downside to these approaches to vision rescue is that each disease requires its own form of gene therapy to correct the particular genetic mutation involved, a time consuming and complex process.

17 Jan 2014

Optogenetics offers a promising therapy for retinal degeneration

For a few years now optogenetics has been seen as a very promising therapy for progressive blindness, for example when it is a result of retinal degeneration.

28 Nov 2013

E-Rare funding recommended for European young investigators network for Usher syndrome

Based on a ranking list that was established by the EU Scientific Evaluation Committee, the E-Rare funding bodies recommended the European young investigators network for Usher syndrome coordinated by Dr. Kerstin Nagel-Wolfrum from Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz for funding. Out of 82 submitted projects, EUR-USH was among the 11 excellent scientific projects that were chosen after a competitive two-step scientific evaluation by peers. In October 2013, researchers held their kick-off meeting in Nijmegen, the Netherlands.

16 Nov 2013

Professor from LSUHSC receives Professor Miroslaw Medal from Polish Academy of Sciences

Nicolas G. Bazan, MD, PhD, Boyd Professor and Director of the LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans Neuroscience Center of Excellence, has been awarded the Professor Miroslaw M. Mossakowski Medal by the Polish Academy of Sciences.

11 Nov 2013

Key marker in blood and urine identifies genetic mutations in gene responsible for RP

Research led by physician-scientists at Bascom Palmer Eye Institute of the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine has produced a breakthrough discovery in diagnosing retinitis pigmentosa, a blinding disease that affects about 1 in 4,000 people in the United States.

16 Oct 2013

Retinitis pigmentosa test identifies mutation found in Ashkenazi Jewish population

You might not think to look to a urine test to diagnose an eye disease. But a new Duke University study says it can link what is in a patient's urine to gene mutations that cause retinitis pigmentosa, or RP, an inherited, degenerative disease that results in severe vision impairment and often blindness. The findings appear online in the Journal of Lipid Research.

9 Oct 2013

Researchers identify mutation in CNGB1 gene causing PRA in Phalene and Papillon

Professor Hannes Lohi's research group at the University of Helsinki and Folkh-lsan Research Center, Finland, has identified a mutation in CNGB1 gene, causing progressive retinal atrophy (PRA) in the Phalene and Papillon dog breeds.

30 Aug 2013

Investigators report complete catalog of genes expressed in retina

Investigators at Massachusetts Eye and Ear and Harvard Medical School have published the most thorough description of gene expression in the human retina reported to date. In a study published today in the journal BMC Genomics, Drs. Michael Farkas, Eric Pierce and colleagues in the Ocular Genomics Institute at Mass. Eye and Ear reported a complete catalog of the genes expressed in the retina.

20 Jul 2013

GenSight Biologics announces closing of €32 million Series A financing

GenSight Biologics, a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of ophthalmic therapeutics using gene therapy, announced today the closing of a €32 million Series A financing.

8 Apr 2013

Lack of very long chain fatty acids does not cause blindness in children with Stargardt type 3

Vision scientists long have thought that lack of very long chain fatty acids in photoreceptor cells caused blindness in children with Stargardt type 3 retinal degeneration, an incurable eye disease. But researchers at the University of Utah's John A. Moran Eye Center have shown in a new study that lack of these fatty acids does not cause blindness, meaning that the search for the mechanism that robs sight from children with the disease must start anew.

12 Mar 2013

Reprogramming eye cells that enable night vision may one day treat retinitis pigmentosa

Doctors may one day treat some forms of blindness by altering the genetic program of the light-sensing cells of the eye, according to scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

29 Jan 2013