Wonkyu Ju
University of California-San Diego, CA·Neuroscience
Glaucoma is a leading cause of blindness worldwide. It slowly destroys the optic nerve, which carries signals from the eye to the brain.
- Fields
Neuroscience
Medicine & Clinical Research
Biochemistry
- Topics
glaucoma
optic neuropathy
retinal ganglion cells
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through May 2027
What they work on
- Define how AIBP, a cholesterol-removing protein, controls activation of the inflammatory receptor TLR4 within lipid rafts of Müller glia, the retina's main support cells.
- Determine how increasing AIBP protects the mitochondrial network and energy production in retinal ganglion cells and Müller glia exposed to glaucoma-like damage, including elevated pressure.
- Test how raising retinal AIBP with adeno-associated virus delivery affects the structure of retinal ganglion cells and the synapses linking them to the brain's visual pathway in mouse glaucoma.
More about the research
Two processes appear to drive this damage: inflammation triggered by glia, the support cells of the retina, and failing mitochondria, the energy-producing parts of cells. Gene studies in patients link glaucoma to variants in TLR4, an immune receptor that switches on inflammation, and to genes involved in cholesterol handling and cell energy. Yet how glial inflammation and mitochondrial failure cause nerve loss is still unclear.
Why it matters
Glaucoma steals vision from millions of people, and current care centers on lowering eye pressure rather than directly protecting nerve cells. If boosting AIBP in the retina calms glial inflammation and protects mitochondria, it could become the basis of a new neuroprotective glaucoma therapy that helps preserve retinal ganglion cells and sight.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Karl Wahlin
University of California-San Diego, CA·Neuroscience
Test whether transcription factors that drive cell division (β-catenin, LIN28) or neuron formation (ASCL1, NEUROG2), delivered by AAV, activate lineage-traced Müller glia in human retinal organoids.
Ahmara Ross
University of Pennsylvania, PA·Neuroscience
Determine how WDR36 WD40-domain variants affect retinal ganglion cell survival and shape, using a WDR36 mutant mouse and RGCs grown from human stem cells with patient mutations.
Karsten Gronert
University of California-Berkeley, CA·Neuroscience
Define which retinal cells make and respond to prostaglandin D2 (PGD2), a fat-derived signaling molecule, in healthy retina and how raised eye pressure (ocular hypertension) shuts this pathway down.
The school
University of California-San Diego: 84 labs on PI Pages, $1.9B a year on research, 637 research doctorates a year.
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