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Generating light-sensitive human retinas in a dish (Courtesy of Valeria Canto-Soler, Ph.D., director of the Ocular Stem Cell and Regeneration Program (CellSight) effective July 1, 2017): Human induced pluripotent stem cells recapitulate in a laboratory dish the developmental steps that lead to the formation of the retina in the human embryo, culminating with the generation of 3D retinal tissue. These “3D mini retinas” recreate the cellular composition of the native human retina, including ganglion cells (green) and photoreceptors (red) with the capacity to sense light. Human 3D mini retinas are being used to develop novel treatments for retinal degenerative diseases such as age-related macular degeneration and retinitis pigmentosa.
