age-related macular degeneration

A new study suggests that DNA synthesized in the cell cytoplasm drives retinal cell death in an advanced form of age-related macular degeneration, a leading cause of blindness.

Researchers insert functioning cone photoreceptors into the retinas of mice with advanced eye disease, improving their vision.

While studying a degenerative eye disease, researchers find the first evidence that cells produce endogenous DNA in the cytoplasm. Drugs that block this activity are linked with reduced risk of atrophic age-related macular degeneration.

Age-related macular degeneration patients who received injections of retinal cells derived from donors’ induced pluripotent stem cells have maintained their level of eyesight for a year.

For the first time, a transplant of replacement tissue grown from stem cells has been shown to be feasible for patients with macular degeneration.

Cell implants, gene therapy, even optogenetics are making headway in clinical trials to treat various forms of blindness.  

A small Phase 1 clinical trial reports that, even at high doses, the treatment did not lead to adverse reactions.

The adipose-derived cells were injected into the patients’ eyes to treat age-related macular degeneration. 

An 80-year-old man with age-related vision loss receives a retinal implant that allows him to see basic shapes.

Researchers inject retinal support cells derived from human embryonic stem cells into the eyes of four men with macular degeneration, bolstering evidence of the experimental treatment’s safety.

The Japanese government will allow a study of stem cell therapy using patients’ own cells, reprogrammed to be stem cells, to treat vision loss.

Preliminary data from human embryonic stem cell trials for two degenerative eye disorders are promising, but challenges remain for more complex tissues.

Japanese researchers are launching an iPS cell trial for an untreatable eye disease, challenging ongoing embryonic stem cell trials.