Immunobiology of Corneal Transplants

Immune Privilege and Retinal Transplantation

Effects of Ultraviolet-B on Contact Hypersensitivity

Current Research Projects:

Immune Privilege and Retinal Transplantation

Recent advances in cell biology and surgical techniques have made the prospect of retinal transplantation for the cure of blindness a serious possibility. An important potential barrier to successful orthotopic retinal transplantation is immune recognition and rejection of foreign antigen-bearing neural retinal and pigment epithelial transplants. The goals of our study are to understand (a) the nature and expression of transplantation and autoantigens on neural retinal and retinal pigment epithelial tissues; (b) the role(s) of retinal microglia (of graft and of host origin) in alerting the immune system to the presence of an intraocular graft and to serve as targets of an immune attack; (c) the capacity of neural retina and of retinal pigment epithelium to display their own inherent immune privilege and to resist immune destruction; and (d) the local microenvironmental factors that dictate immune privilege in the subretinal space. The ultimate goal is to eliminate immune rejection as a barrier to transplantation so that retinal transplants can be used to cure blindness.

Grant Support
NIH, EY09595, “Immune Privilege and Retinal Transplantation”

Current Postdoctoral Fellows
Parisa Zamiri, M.D.

Current Collaborators
Michael J. Young, Ph.D., Tat Fong Ng, Ph.D.

Papers Published/In Press since January 1, 2002.

Wenkel, H. and Streilein, J.W. Evidence that retinal pigment epithelium functions as an immune privileged tissue. Invest. Ophthal. Vis. Sci. 41: 3467 – 3473, 2000.

Ng, Tat Fong, and Streilein, J.W. Light-induced migration of retinal microglia into the subretinal space. Invest. Ophthal. Vis. Sci., 42: 3301 – 3310, 2001.

Streilein, J. W., Ma, N., Wenkel, H., Ng, T.F., and Zamiri, P. Immunobiology and privilege of neuronal retina and pigment epithelium transplants. Vision Research 42: 487 – 495, 2002.