What if you could prevent macular degeneration with an eyedrop?

A new start-up company is looking into the possibility of certain compounds that appear to boost mitochondrial function to provide “energy” to “reduced capacity” mitochondria in retinal cells that are possibly at the root of retinal degenerations in such diseases as retinitis pigmentosa and macular degeneration.

Two scientists, Drs. Rohrer and Beeson, of the Ophthalmology department at the Medical University of South Carolina have started a new company, MitoChem Therapeutics, that has just received $2 million from the Foundation Fighting Blindness to do just that. After screening a library of 50,000 drug compounds, they have apparently identified three compounds that appear to boost mitochondrial function, and will now attempt to identify which one will work best in people as an eye drop, and move it into a clinical trial.

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