Cells Grown in Lab Can Reach Out and Connect to Other Retina Cells

Wednesday, April 5 2023 | 08 h 30 min | Vision Science

Fighting Blindness Canada (FBC) funded scientist Dr. David Gamm (University of Wisconsin) has successfully shown that photoreceptor cells grown from stem cells can reach out and connect with their neighboring cells. Published in the journal PNAS, this study brings us one step closer to testing a stem cell therapy in humans in a clinical trial.

The death of photoreceptor cells leads to vision loss in retinal diseases, such as inherited retinal diseases (e.g. retinitis pigmentosa or Usher syndrome) or age-related macular degeneration.

Gene therapies are one form that may prevent the death of photoreceptor cells and therefore slow down vision loss. However, if retinal degeneration and vision loss is advanced, gene therapy treatments won’t work. This is when stem cell therapy comes in; where new cells such as photoreceptors cells are grown in a lab and then transplanted back into the eye replacing cells that have died or been damaged. Stem cell therapy offers hope to restore vision that is lost. So far, we have not seen a successful therapy that replaces photoreceptor cells.