Concept illustration of the electrode technology to restore a person’s optic nerve function after an eye transplant. Credit- Jungho Yi of the Dayeh’s lab at UC San Diego (1) (1)
Researchers at UC San Diego plan to develop a wireless, multi-modal electrode system wired to the brain to restore vision after an eye transplant.
Bringing together more than 40 scientists, doctors and industry experts, the team hopes to make vision-restoring whole-eye transplants a reality. Their system could wire the optic nerve to the brain with high-end precision. Professor Shadi Dayeh in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering is leading the UCSD team on that front.
Scripps Research Associate Professor in the Department of Molecular Medicine Anne Hanneken will lead a team set to advance neuroprotective surgical protocols, perfusion techniques and monitoring systems. They aim to support the long-term viability of the whole eyes and the surgical transplant procedure.
Hanneken and Dayeh will work jointly with Dr. Jeffrey Goldberg, chair of ophthalmology at the Byers Eye Institute at Stanford University. They join principal investigator, Dr. José-Alain Sahel, professor and chair of the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of Pittsburgh. Sahel co-directs the initiative.
Dayeh says the electrode interface technology and end-to-end systems developed at UCSD will map the human eye, optic nerve and visual cortex at high resolutions. It could also help regenerate the optic nerve after an eye transplant.
The team’s biggest challenge is moving whole eye transplants from aesthetic to functional. The researchers need to figure out how to regenerate the optic nerve, which connects the eye to the brain.
Dayeh’s group invented a biocompatible electrode interface that uses platinum nanorods (PtNRs) that can be applied in various areas of the central and peripheral nervous system (CNS and PNS, respectively). These devices come in multiple forms, such as electrode arrays with thousands of channels to capture brain activity in high resolution.
Early on in the project, the team aimed to use a grid composed of tens of thousands of light-emitting diodes. These stimulate the retina and map topographical organization of the retinal-optic nerve-brain pathways in animals in humans. In later phases, the group plans to use human-grade, inflatable electrodes developed to stimulate and regenerate the optic nerve.
“The scientific questions we are addressing now are so complicated and complex that you really need the best and brightest collaborators with multidisciplinary expertise to make a true impact,” Hanneken said in a post at the university’s website. “Our recent success in restoring light signaling in postmortem human organ donor eyes was only possible with a great team. This team approach will now allow us to reconsider the prediction made by Dr. Roger Guillemin, Nobel Laureate in Physiology and former president of the Salk Institute, who told me 30 years ago that we would be performing whole eye transplants in my lifetime.”
