Apoptosis in human retinal degenerations.

Abstract

PURPOSE: This paper examined the role of apoptosis in human retinal degenerations including pathologic myopia, age-related macular degeneration, serous retinal detachment, retinal lattice, and paving stone degenerations. METHOD: Thirty-seven enucleated human eyes with 1 of the above-mentioned retinal degenerations were studied by histopathology and by TdT-mediated biotin-dUTP nicked-end labelling (TUNEL) technique. RESULTS: Tunnel labelling characteristic DNA fragmentation of apoptosis was observed in photoreceptor cells in 2 of the 4 eyes with pathologic myopia and in 4 of 16 eyes with age-related macular degeneration, 2 of which were exudative and 2 of which were atrophic. However, only a few scattered photoreceptor cells were labelled in 4 of 8 eyes with serous retinal detachment secondary to malignant melanoma of the choroid. Moreover, none of the photoreceptors cells in the 4 eyes with retinal lattice degeneration and 6 eyes with retinal paving stone degeneration were labelled. CONCLUSIONS: Apoptosis is 1 of the important pathways of photoreceptor cell degeneration in pathologic myopia and age-related macular degeneration.

Full text

PDF

• 411
• 412
• 413
• 414
• 415
• …
• 431
• Next

Images in this article

FIGURE 1A
on p.414

FIGURE 1B
on p.414

FIGURE 1C
on p.414

FIGURE 2A
on p.415

FIGURE 2B
on p.416

FIGURE 2C
on p.416

FIGURE 3A
on p.417

FIGURE 3B
on p.417

FIGURE 4A
on p.418

FIGURE 4B
on p.418

FIGURE 5A
on p.419

FIGURE 5B
on p.419

FIGURE 6A
on p.420

FIGURE 6B
on p.420

FIGURE 6C
on p.420

FIGURE 6D
on p.420

FIGURE 7A
on p.421

FIGURE 7B
on p.421

FIGURE 7C
on p.422

FIGURE 8A
on p.423

FIGURE 8B
on p.423

FIGURE 8C
on p.424

FIGURE 9A
on p.425

FIGURE 9B
on p.425

FIGURE 10A
on p.426

FIGURE 10B
on p.426