Researchers Focus On Genes Connected To Age-Associated Macular Degeneration

Scientists at National Eye Institute spearheaded a joint study and zeroed in on genes related to AMD (age-associated macular degeneration), a leading factor of blindness and vision loss amongst individuals age 65 and older. These results offer a more in-depth and extended picture of the contributions of genes to AMD, and they show new ways for development of the treatment. The study was posted in Nature Genetics.

“If we were performing a criminal probe, previous research would have localized various crime syndicates within 34 zip codes to 52 streets. These newest results verify actual suspects. It gives direct targets that we can investigate more closely,” claimed the lead investigator of the study, Anand Swaroop, to the media in an interview. Earlier, Swaroop and associates had evaluated populations of people without and with AMD and verified 34 small genomic areas—dubbed as loci—and 52 genetic versions within these loci that were considerably related with AMD.

On a related note, as per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in 4 deaths in the U.S. every year is owing to heart disease. It is the top killer of both women and men, but the genetic complexity of the disease makes it hard to treat. In a lately-posted paper in npj Systems Biology and Applications, Alain Karma, the Northeastern professor for physics, and his associates define their discovery of 36 earlier unidentified genes concerned in failure of heart.

The team verified that one of those genes has a fundamental role in cardiac hypertrophy. Cardiac hypertrophy is an abnormal solidifying of the muscle in the heart that can result in heart failure. “This is a thrilling direction for modified medicine, and also for verifying therapeutic targets and genes for complicated diseases that include many genes,” Karma claimed. The eventual aim is to generate modified therapeutic drugs to overturn heart disease.