In what is World Retina Week (September 18-23), the British Retinitis Pigmentosa Society has been awarded a £129,500 grant from GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) in its 2006 medical research awards.
This is the second time in five years that the BRPS has won one of the grants, which will fund a two-year project on 'The identification of novel loci and genes causing autosomal recessive retinal disease using autozygosity mapping of consanguineous pedigrees'.
Project leader Andrew Webster, honorary consultant ophthalmologist at Moorfields Eye Hospital, carries out research through the Institute of Ophthalmology, at University College London. He aims to complete the jigsaw of discovering genes that cause different forms of the eye disease, retinitis pigmentosa (RP) and related conditions.
'Many genes have been discovered that cause dominant and X-linked forms of RP,' he said, 'but less work has been carried out on recessive RP, partly because up to now the genes have been more difficult to find. However, new technology has opened up new opportunities.'
The study will focus on families where cousins or other close relatives have married and had children affected by retinal disease. The affected individuals are expected to have the same markers on both their chromosomes near the disease gene. The advent of gene chip technology has greatly speeded up the screening process.
'Each discovery of a disease gene increases our knowledge of how the human retina works and brings closer the day when treatments for RP will be found using gene therapy or other means,' the BRPS added.
? Marking World Retina Week, the president of Retina International, Christina Fasser, said it was creating awareness of the devastating effects of retinal degenerations and the fact that these conditions can surface in any family at any time. 'The most common form occurs in families with no known history of blindness - everyone is at risk.'