Marina Gorbatyuk, PhD, a researcher at the UAB School of Optometry, has been awarded a $1.25 million grant from the National Eye Institute to study the regulation of protein synthesis in photoreceptors of mice with inherited retinal degeneration.

Gorbatyuk's study will look at molecules that govern the rate of protein biosynthesis in the retinas of mice mimicking human inherited retinal degeneration. Because of the expression of aberrant proteins in the biosynthesis that is present with retinal degeneration, the cells of the retina experience stress. That chronic cellular stress activates an unfolded protein response in the photoreceptors and inhibits protein synthesis altogether, ultimately resulting in vision loss. Gorbatyuk plans to target and reprogram the response, which could slow photoreceptor cell death or even stop it.

As a result of the study, targeted therapies could be developed to slow or stop vision loss.