The Foundation Fighting Blindness, which is the driving force in the global development of treatments and cures for blinding diseases, announced that the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H), an agency within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, announced it has awarded the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, the Foundation and six other researcher groups up to $46 million to support research and innovation in vision-restoring human whole eye transplantation.
The Foundation has assembled a multidisciplinary team of renowned scientists, researchers, and physicians at multiple research institutions. Their shared goal is to accelerate convergent technologies to achieve the mission outlined by ARPA-H: to cure blindness within six years.
This consortium will be led by the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus (the prime recipient of the award), and includes Johns Hopkins University, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Indiana University School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, and the National Eye Institute.
This federal program, THEA (Total Human Eye-allotransplantation Advancement), has been established by the ARPA-H Health Science Futures Office (HSF), to advance the development of a combination of medical, therapeutic and surgical technologies to advance whole eye transplantation as a cure for blindness in people with ocular-based disease or damage.
The Foundation has played a major role in the advancement of treatments and cures for blinding diseases. To date, it has raised over $954 million to fund cutting-edge research and launched more than 45 clinical trials for potential treatments.
The Foundation will also serve as the consortium’s strategic point and central function of ensuring progress maintains alignment with the program requirements and mission. Chad Jackson, Ph. D., the Foundation’s senior director of the Preclinical Translational Research Program, will oversee the six-year project.
This program will be led by principal investigator Kia Washington, M.D., a clinician, scientist and professor in the department of surgery at the University of Colorado (CU) Anschutz Medical Campus. And Dr. Washington is leading groundbreaking research at CU in eye transplantation and vision restoration, building on deep research and surgical experience in facial and eye transplantation.
The main goal of ARPA-H’s THEA program is to build on the latest advancements in medicines, cell therapies and surgical techniques to regenerate retinal and optic nerve cells and restore their connectivity to the brain to enable functional vision. And additional program goals include improving tissue harvest and preservation, optimizing optic nerve reattachment and repair technologies, and advancing surgical strategies, post-op care and ocular health assessment tools.
KEY QUOTES:
“While vision-restoring whole eye transplantation holds tremendous potential, there are significant technical and biological challenges that must be overcome before it can become a viable clinical reality, most notably the vexing challenge of regenerating nerve cells and re-establishing vision signal connectivity in a grafted optic nerve. Our team has assembled sub-groups of experts in their respective fields to best position us to achieve ARPA-H’s mission. By working in tandem teams on developing therapies and technologies to overcome current limitations in donor eye preservation, optic nerve regeneration, surgical techniques and post-operation strategies, we’ll accelerate progress and bring whole eye replacement closer to clinical application. I look forward to kicking off the project and collaborating with such a talented and passionate team.”
– Dr. Jackson
“The potential of whole eye transplantation is truly revolutionary. Despite advancements in facial and eye transplantation, whole eye transplantation has yet to achieve successful vision restoration. I’m thrilled to be part of the team working to advance progress toward making human whole eye allotransplantation as a cure for blindness a reality.”
– Dr. Washington
“On behalf of the board and the Foundation, I extend my gratitude to ARPA-H and this multi-institutional team for the opportunity to continue our work of advancing the most promising research and technologies to cure blindness. We are closer than ever to realizing the potential of vision restoration, and as a person impacted by a blinding retinal disease, I look forward to recovery of my vision through breakthroughs achieved in the THEA program.”
– Karen Petrou, chair of the Foundation Fighting Blindness board
“The Foundation Fighting Blindness is wholly committed to changing what we think is possible for people impacted by vision loss by pursuing research and development programs with the potential to be life changing. This project has tremendous potential to solve barriers to seeing through another’s transplanted eyes and revolutionize how we approach and treat blindness. Furthermore, we anticipate implications of our work will bring a seismic change in medical capabilities to benefit millions beyond blindness and inform future innovations and advancements in medicine.”
– Jason Menzo, CEO of the Foundation Fighting Blindness
