Project Summary
Karthik Shekhar, PhD, plans to use innovative molecular techniques, artificial intelligence (AI) approaches, and lab models to tease apart how different cell pathways interact in cell destruction in glaucoma. Focusing on the death of retinal ganglion cells, which underlies vision loss in the disease, Dr. Shekhar and his colleagues expect to uncover new treatment targets.
In their expansive approach, Dr. Shekhar and his team will capture a huge amount of information about where and when pathways in retinal nerve cells are active during cell degeneration. They will use intact cells and apply novel approaches to tracking where the cell changes during this destruction. The researchers also will use a lab model of glaucoma to monitor individual cells for their responses to internal and external inputs during degeneration.
The work is expected to generate an enormous amount of visual and other information about what happens in cells undergoing destruction, which the researchers plan to process using AI approaches. The result will be a detailed molecular map of how and where neurodegeneration occurs in these cells, opening the way to new treatment possibilities and use of these tools in human studies.
