HTTP:: Gene Therapy Cures Color Blindness
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Experts at the University of Washington in Seattle have recently announced the first successful treatment of color blindness using gene therapy, in squirrel monkeys. The method has been applied on animals that were born with the condition, not that developed it over the course of their lifetimes. The new research brings forth new hope of finding a cure for the condition, which adversely affects the quality of life of many people suffering from it as well, Nature News reports. “This is a truly amazing study. If we can target gene expression specifically to cones [in humans] then this has a tremendous implication,†University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia veterinary ophthalmologist and vision researcher Andras Komaromy says. He has not been directly involved in the new study. Details of the amazing feat are published in the latest issue of the renowned scientific journal Nature. The paper shows how these experiments could be used on other visual impairments as well. !
Saimiri sciureus, the squirrel monkey, is the perfect animal model for color blindness. In order for humans or monkeys to see green and red, they have to have two versions of a gene known as opsin. One of these versions codes the green photoreceptors on the retina, while the other codes the red ones. Because male S. sciureus monkeys have on...
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http://news.softpedia.com/news/Gene-Therapy-Cures-Color-Blindness-121877.shtml
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