Age-related macular degeneration is the leading cause of blindness in older adults, yet researchers are still in the dark about many of the factors that cause this incurable disease.
New insight from University of Florida (UF) and German researchers about a genetic link between rhesus monkeys with macular degeneration and humans could unlock secrets about the earliest stages of the disease, when severe vision loss could still be stopped.
The researchers pinpointed a chromosome region and genetic markers for macular degeneration in humans and rhesus monkeys, findings recently published in the online edition of the journal Experimental Eye Research. Linking the disease in monkeys to the disease in humans allows researchers to study how it progresses in the animals, which could lead to better treatments and even a cure.
“Stopping the development of the disease is something the monkeys will help us do that we can’t do with humans,” said William W. Dawson, a UF professor of ophthalmology and physiology and a co-author of the study. “This is a big step forward in dealing with the disease.”
The researchers studied seven genetic sites in the monkeys that correspond to human chromosomes linked to macular disease. One of those areas, the findings confirm, contains genes that predict age-related macular degeneration in humans and rhesus monkeys. Dawson and other researchers have suspected for years that the disease was very similar in humans and monkeys, but these findings finally establish that. This discovery, he said, will allow researchers to delve deeper into what causes the disease and could be the first step toward repairing the genetic defects linked to it.
Knowing more about the earliest predictors of macular degeneration could help doctors treat the disease before extensive vision loss occurs and may even prevent it in some people. The early risks associated with macular degeneration have been difficult for researchers to study in humans, and as a result, doctors know little about this aspect of the disease, Dawson said.
Adapted from the following source: University of Florida