Charity funds eye disease research

Optical charity Fight for Sight has announced funding for three PhD studentships costing over £60,000 each to start in October this year.

Professor Penny Handford's group from the Department of Biochemistry at Oxford will be working towards new therapies for macular degeneration. The research will examine the structure and function of mutant proteins which cause age-related macular degeneration (AMD) - the leading cause of severe sight loss in adults over 50 in the Western world.

Through the second PhD the MRC Human Genetics Unit at Western General Hospital in Edinburgh, lead by Dr Xinhua Shu and Professor Alan Wright, will look into the role played by genes in causing eye disease such as AMD.

Dr Michael Cheetham, team leader of the molecular chaperone research group at London's Institute of Ophthalmology will lead a project to build an understanding of the molecular basis of retinitis pigmentosa, and to identify a basis for new therapies. This area of research looks to identify ways to use a natural molecular defence system of the body to prevent blindness.

Fight for Sight is currently funding a total of 11 PhD studentships in the UK.