2021/08/16
Keio University School of Medicine
A research group from the Department of Ophthalmology, Keio University School of Medicine, led by Senior Lecturer Toshihide Kurihara, Project Assistant Professor Hiromitsu Kunimi, and Deokho Lee (a second-year student in the Doctoral Programs at the Graduate School of Medicine), has confirmed that genetically suppressing the expression of the transcription factor hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) has an inhibitory effect on retinal neuronal cell death in a mouse model of retinal ischemia-reperfusion.
Furthermore, from dozens of genes transcriptionally regulated by HIF-1α, they identified BCL2 19 kDa interacting protein 3 (BNIP3) as the gene responsible for retinal neuronal cell death.
These research findings elucidate part of the mechanism of retinal neuronal cell death in glaucoma, which is the leading cause of blindness in Japan and for which a curative treatment is difficult, and are expected to lead to the development of new treatments for the condition.
These research findings were published in the online edition of the interdisciplinary general journal "The FASEB Journal" on July 27, 2021 (GMT).
Please see below for the full press release.