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  • A New Promoter Allows Optogenetic Vision Restoration with Enhanced Sensitivity in Macaque Retina.

A New Promoter Allows Optogenetic Vision Restoration with Enhanced Sensitivity in Macaque Retina.

Molecular therapy : the journal of the American Society of Gene Therapy (2017-08-16)
Antoine Chaffiol, Romain Caplette, Céline Jaillard, Elena Brazhnikova, Mélissa Desrosiers, Elisabeth Dubus, Laëtitia Duhamel, Emilie Macé, Olivier Marre, Patrick Benoit, Philippe Hantraye, Alexis-Pierre Bemelmans, Ernst Bamberg, Jens Duebel, José-Alain Sahel, Serge Picaud, Deniz Dalkara
PMID28807567
ABSTRACT

The majority of inherited retinal degenerations converge on the phenotype of photoreceptor cell death. Second- and third-order neurons are spared in these diseases, making it possible to restore retinal light responses using optogenetics. Viral expression of channelrhodopsin in the third-order neurons under ubiquitous promoters was previously shown to restore visual function, albeit at light intensities above illumination safety thresholds. Here, we report (to our knowledge, for the first time) activation of macaque retinas, up to 6 months post-injection, using channelrhodopsin-Ca