Researchers at Ireland’s Trinity College Dublin reported they have identified a single gene, SARM1, that is a key driver of vision impairment and blindness.
PhD candidate and study co-author Laura Finnegan said that deleting the SARM1 gene in a mouse model offered protection from rotenone-induced retinal degeneration. “In response to injury, SARM1 contributes to a process that leads to the degeneration of specialised cells and their axons in the eye. When this happens it essentially means that the optic nerve can no longer deliver signals from the eye to the brain.”
Senior author Professor Jane Farrar said visual function was still preserved when reassessed four months after SARM1 was deleted. “This raises hopes that a targeted therapy delivered early enough may offer people diagnosed with an ocular neuropathy long-lasting preservation of sight.”
The study was published in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences.
