University of Washington researchers say they’ve used stem cells to help repair mouse retinas in the lab. That could help people with macular degeneration.
Thomas Reh is professor of biological structure and lead researcher in the study. He says the results are better than he expected.
Thomas Reh: "Now what we’re doing, which hasn’t been published yet, but I think it’s our next step, you could say, is to put these cells into the eyes of blind mice and fix the blind mice so that they can see."
If experiments at the UW and other institutions continue to succeed, the first human trials could begin in about two years.
Macular degeneration affects about 10 million people in the US. The disease is a lading cause of blindness in the elderly.
The UW experiment used embryonic stem cells from a line that existed before President Bush barred federal funding for research on additional cell lines in August 2001.
