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Gene Therapy Restores Sight To Blind
An anonymous reader writes "Looks like we have found a cure for genetic blindness (clinical trial — abstract — paper [PDF] — ABC News video). This gene therapy treatment increases both cone and rod photoreceptor-based vision. These engineered viruses are implanted to do our bidding to restore vision. Clinical trials on 6 children and young people proved the therapy and didn't find any notable side effects." Any blind person, especially any adapted and competent one, who wants to gain the sense of sight would be well advised to study Oliver Sachs's classic piece "To See and Not See."
How?
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
"I see! I see!!" said the blind man, but everyone knew he was full of shit.
Until now when he CAN actually say it and follow it up with high fives to everyone.
Every time I get cranky about all the dumb shit that we do in this day and age, I also think about all the cool and fantastic things we can do. It's a funny balance.
Moved to http://soylentnews.org/. You are invited to join us too!
I see said the blind man as he picked up his hammer and saw.
For personal reasons, I'm very curious to see how this technology turns out. Hopefully it will be applied more broadly.
Could this apply to myopia too? Could it be an option to LASIK?
I'd do it for colourblindness.
"...if only you could see what I've seen with your eyes!"
Are they going to give these people TWO sighted eyes?
Losing sight has always been my greatest fear. I understand a lot of blind people can live perfectly fine lives, but I can't think of many worse futures. (I know the news are about genetic blindness, but still).
The day someone comes up with a way of completely bypassing the eyes, for example by perfecting the technology of connecting cameras directly to the brain, will feel as important for me as the day someone finds a way of curing all medular wounds.
It may sound stupid but one of the few reasons I've got for accumulating more money is being able to pay the medicine I hope will exist by the time my body starts failing in those kind of ways.
The clinical trial and abstract are from 2008 and the pdf is of a paper published in 2005... this is 2010.
"All three patients showed a statistically significant increase in visual sensitivity at 30 days after treatment localized to retinal areas that had received the vector."
Well, one notable side-affect of the virus was improved vision.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/09/colortherapy/
I have a feeling this will be up for a Nobel Prize. It was seriously groundbreaking work and the entire vision science community is excited about it.
My children might have an incurable genetic blindness (we haven't tested them) that causes progressive blindness. After researching a bit, I found that the blind and visually impaired can use computers quite well with screen readers, but there wasn't a lot of accessible software -- especially games. http://www.audio-games.net/ was a great resource and helped me design an accessible audio-RPG called Entombed. http://www.blind-games.com/ - Full disclaimer: my site. I think the biggest hurdle (obvious from reading some of these comments) is that there isn't a lot of awareness that the blind can navigate and use computers.
after a quick look at the paper linked in the article (Identifying photoreceptors in blind eyes caused by RPE65 mutations: Prerequisite for human gene therapy success), it is clearly not about gene therapy in humans. it is a study of the thickness of the retina in humans homozygous for a mutation in a specific retinal gene. as the title says, it is a prerequisite for gene therapy.
the actual paper, Human gene therapy for RPE65 isomerase deficiency activates the retinoid cycle of vision but with slow rod kinetics, can be found here. It concerns the same gene, incidentally.
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun the frumious Bandersnatch.
Nothing to see here move along..... wait a second...
Doctors do Massage in Longview WA now, who knew?
I took a high-level bio class at UC Berkeley this past semester that concerned exactly this type of genetic therapy. someone brought up the idea of doing this to normals with the pit viper IR heat-sensitive ionic channel gene, tie it to some downstream color of choice.
sign me up.
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun the frumious Bandersnatch.
I have retinitis pigmentosa which affects me in a number of different ways. At the moment it's the night blindness that's the most problematic. But as the disease is a degenerative one and as there's no way to predict (or even give a rough estimate of) the time when I will be fully blind, not a day goes past when I don't think of what it will be like to be completely in the dark. I read these stories all the time and they're all like stories on holographic storage tech: Just 5-10 more years and it'll be here for me to enjoy...
As usual, ABC News reaches for the M word. Nothing supernatural.. more like many years of painstaking and brilliant science.
Sach's story _is_ a brilliant story. As imho are most of his stories.
no, I don't have a sig
At least, superficially related in that it's to do with how the brain interprets visual data, which covers a similar topic to the New Yorker article:
TED Talk: Pawan Sinha on how brains learn to see.
I mean, wow, hasn't restoring sight to the blind been one of the attributes of divine powers? I hope this advance which comes from the ingenuity and intelligence of MAN will help shake the faith of those who believe in such fairytales as the flying spaghetti monster et all. Maybe when we all have hoverboards, walking on water won't seem such a big deal as well.
Yeah, now it's 5:30 in the morning. Thanks a lot.
Is it just me, or does 6 patients seem rather few for a significant trial ?
What a depressingly stupid machine.
You talk about your woman,
I wish you could see mine
You talk about your woman,
I wish you could see mine
Everytime she starts to lovin'
She brings eyesight to the blind
You know her daddy gave her magic,
I can tell by the way she walks
Her daddy gave her magic,
I can tell by the way she walks
Everytime she start to shakin'
The dumb begin to talk
She's got the power to heal you, never fear!
She's got the power to heal you, never fear!
Just a word from her lips
And the deaf begin to hear
People are still making plenty of text games, even more elaborate than the ones from the 80s (thanks to increased memory capacity, better tools, and evolving expectations). And indeed, they're popular with blind players who use screen readers.
Visual IRC: Fast. Powerful. Free.
Borrow a few neurons from the visual centre of my brain. It would be interesting to see how a "normal" person views the world instead of processing light and colours (mind you colours are done basically by light refractions of the material) with the intensity that I do. Shopping in a supermarket is little short of a nightmare thanks to strip lighting and the aforementioned intensity of vision.
Offer's also open to deaf persons. I can hear people from across a busy room of other people. Also have to turn off my HD/DVD recorder because I can hear it's fans from across my room at night.
Um, it takes a fuck load more than SIX kids to /PROVE/ something. SIX isn't anywhere close to statistical significance, nor does it even remotely demonstrate safety. Proven/proof are VERY big words and shouldn't be thrown around lightly. These preliminary results may be encouraging, but are FAR from proof. Especially, in the medical field.
Early-onset, severe retinal dystrophy caused by mutations in the gene encoding retinal pigment epithelium–specific 65-kDa protein (RPE65) is associated with poor vision at birth and complete loss of vision in early adulthood.
Along with their solution:
We administered to three young adult patients subretinal injections of recombinant adeno-associated virus vector 2/2 expressing RPE65 complementary DNA (cDNA) under the control of a human RPE65 promoter.
Makes me think that this seems like a highly specific approach and will only work on people who've had damage done on that protein, not general blindness altogether. There are MANY people who are or become blind for genetic or developmental reasons, and it doesn't seem that this work will help them much, if at all. For instance, the only woman who I had a "serious" multi-year relationship with (so far) has aniridia , which is a condition which is a genetic condition that causes defects in the PAX6 gene on one of the copies of chromosome 11, causing the person to be born without an iris (more information here). (The funny thing about that disorder is that it's genetically one more gene mutation away from practically killing the person.) Besides nsytgmus, cataracts and tons of other optical nasties, it eventually leads to blindness most of the time that doesn't seem to be correctable by this approach.
But it's a great start and I hope that more breakthroughs like this begin to surface.
Now do baldness.
From the Abstract it seems this study was reported on July, 2008. Where is the follow up?
$sig not found
"I'd do it for colourblindness." - by retech (1228598) on Tuesday May 04, @02:46AM (#32082214)
I would as well (and, for how crappy my eyes have become (to the point I require bi-focal glasses (though I don't use those here, I just take off my specs to read is all)))...
I would also do so, for color blindness, like you mention (I.E.-> I have difficulties with shades of dark green, and red, AND some colors of dark navy blue and dark purple, plus some shades of yellow an LIGHT green as well)).
It caused me hassles in highschool electronics class, where I was batting off A's on tests, but when it came to labs, stuff went on fire once (smoking actually) & it got me into trouble.
At the principle's office, they asked me why I was doing stupid stuff like that, and I told them I didn't mean to...
The teacher told my principal I was a good student, and interested and participated like MAD in the theory sections for tests too. They then got wise & put me on a lantern test...
Sure enough, color blind too here (lol, when the Good Lord handed out eyes, I got the bottom-of-the-barrell (hey, @ least they're blue though, lol!)).
Anyhow/anyways:
Were I to have this done, I suppose I'd finally see what I've been missing (and, the ONLY reason I am not an Electrical Engineer, is because of it - this is the "how/why" of why I got into Computer Science instead, closest thing I could do to get into the field of electronics was this I figured)...
Now - the only part I'd miss, is that camoflage doesn't work vs. how I see (so I've heard) & apparently, the military uses folks with my eyesight type to "walk point" & spot hidden enemy bunkers etc. et al (of course, by walking point, I'd imagine you'd take the 1st bullets too). For example, there's "lantern tests" (dots with numbers in them etc.) that only a color blind person can see, whereas a normal color sighted person, cannot.
APK
P.S.=> Heh, additionally? I loved your reference to this:
"Chu - ...if only you could see what I've seen with your eyes!" - ROY BATTY, from "Blade Runner"
Of course, my FAV. quote from that excellent classic Sci-Fi film, would be near the ending when Roy Batty dies, and respects ALL life and saves Decker (Harrison Ford) from death, rather than kill him (even though Decker was the blade runner unit assigned to "retire the skinjob" named Roy Batty):
"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. I've attacked ships on fire, off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die." - ROY BATTY, from "Blade Runner"... apk
I am in the same boat. Fascinating read, but man, so long.
I'm curious if a similar treatment could be developed for people with ocular albinism. It seems like a similar genetic defect with similar symptoms. More information at http://www.albinism.org/publications/what_is_albinism.html
I have the exact same situation. Even down to the not learning as much about electronics back in the day because I would miss on wire colors and resistor color bands etc. The other thing you mention, in seeing detail in the field is also correct. I can see animals and oddball stuff hidden in the bushes etc quite well. Even beat my dogs a lot when we are out walking around, because my brain doesn't think in color so much as it does shapes/lines, etc. I only see some very "loud" and brilliant basic colors, shades, etc..nope. Miss a lot. The docs said I was red green deficient. Well, heck ya! That's why I got tested in the first place...
Anyway, I'll see the rabbit or squirrel or deer or wild turkey, etc well before they do, even close by. And other oddball things like that..for instance I can walk into a room and if a pin is on the floor, dropped accidentally, I will see it almost immediately, it just jumps out as a "wrongness" to the over all expected patterns. Coins on the sidewalk, freaking lots of them over the years. Even just the roundness of a copper penny will stand out to me laying in a green lawn.
So ya, tradeoffs, your brain compensates.
To be clear, there are multiple forms of blindness. I happen to be stuck with severe myopia and cone dystrophy - so shit's blurry and the daystar messes me up. The therapy described won't fix the myopia, but holy crap that's the closest thing I've heard of to a fix for the cone-rod mess in my life to this point. Mitigating that might not improve my ability to focus, but it might help reduce the strain on my eyes from things like looking around outside, even on cloudy days. A pair of good wraparound sunglasses already provides some relief, but they can't be worn everywhere...
I hope this works out. And as for that little aside from kdawson... I understand that some people do not adapt well to gaining visual capability they previously lacked, but unless you're squinting at a computer screen or iPod, or using a screen reader, or you've worked in a therapeutic or adaptive capacity with visually impaired individuals (or lived with one), then I'm not inclined to take that aside as anything but kdawson trying to be "deep". I, personally, just felt patronized and condescended to, and my initial reaction to that bit of editor splooge was much shorter and far more profane.
Someday, you're going to die. Get over it.
I watched blind computer scientist T. V. Raman give a lecture in which he played audio Tetris at the end, although he apparently hadn't known to that point that the visual part of audio Tetris (which existed solely for the benefit of the audience) didn't actually work. This appears to be the Emacs code for audio Tetris.
Of all the respondents here, you'll understand maybe what I mean in my subject line above.
See... I really do NOT like having this partially color-blind thing going though. Sort of sucks, sometimes.
Funniest part is, and I am certain YOU will understand, is that I can see GREEN, I can see RED, I can see YELLOW too, when they're all by themselves, oddly enough!
However, not when you put certain shades of them ontop of or near one another (Dark Red, & Dark Green + Light Green, & Yellow). I have to really, Really, REALLY try to discern them (shape helps though).
APK
I'm really old, I remember when we built the Internet.
There used to be a larger proportion of blind folk on the Internet than in the general (western, industrialized) population. They had these crazy mechanical braille readers that you can't get any more. On the the pre-web internet, they were full citizens just as capable as anyone else.
It was sort of like the way you find more gay people in a Unitarian Universalist church than in the general population; because the other churches don't like them, they end up UU if they want to belong to a church. Similarly, if you wanted to be scientist, blindness was a gigantic handicap, but much less so in computer science since we typed everything out and rarely (liquid gopherspace not withstanding) used pictures. Deaf people were easily accommodated too.
But modern web designers, especially the commercial ones (look at HP or Microsoft's web sites lately in elinks?) blithely write off the 10% or so of potential customers/participants who are not gifted with perfect vision, color perception, and hearing.
The W3C would like to change this and they keep morphing HTML to try to include the huge resource of human intellect that handicapped people are. So, they make "emphasis" and "italic" and "bold" and "Strong" mean different things. But most web designers are too pigheaded to notice and most commercial enterprises are incapable of seeing the benefit of treating 100% of the human race as potential customers.
6yr old x-ray visioned zombies. Just what we needed. They can _see_ your brain.
We are eternal, all this pain is an illusion.
Thanks for the info. Grishnakh: I wasn't aware of that. I'm (I suppose) "too far gone" down the road into CSC though (16 yrs. time into it or thereabouts professionally & as mostly a DB programmer (it's the "steady-eddy" end of the field, with the most jobs typically is why, pretty much anywhere you go, as businesses are all diff. in how they manage their information vs. one another typically is why)).
APK
There's another aspect to colorblindness that has to do with extreme short term memory as well. And I just cannot recall the exact name of it, it is a somewhat recent discovery. But it fits the situation you, and to a lesser extent, I have as well. If you get a separate distinct color and it is named for you, you can see it, but a few minutes later, if it is mixed in with other colors, your brain forgets exactly what it looks like so it goes back to the grayscale memory of it you had developed previously.
Thanks! I didn't know that about new resistors!
What was bogus back then was my dad was the local radio and TV fixit guy (as his side hobby, he was a big iron guy during the day, mainframes repair and troubleshooting), so we always had a real decent shop at the house. But, try as I might, I just could never get beyond the simple stuff from not being able to read wires and resistors.
I do some work with electronics, but it is limited to just repairs on equipment, etc and I can run the ohm meter OK, hip to that at least. Most of my semi innovative work is just base mechanical for the most part, I just like building and repairing stuff I need to work with, a little basic welding, etc. My alternate energy stuff is all basic wiring so that isn't hard, serial or parallel, positive or ground, choose. That's easy. I'll let the more extreme hobbyists and devs come up with the new exotic gadgets, then I'll get one once they have been on the market long enough to get cheap..heh.