The integrity of retinal pigment epithelial cells is critical for photoreceptor cell survival and vision. The essential omega-3 fatty acid, docosahexaenoic acid, attains its highest concentration in the human body in photoreceptors. Docosahexaenoic acid is the essential precursor of neuroprotectin D1 (NPD1). NPD1 acts against apoptosis mediated by A2E, a byproduct of phototransduction that beco...

Zinc, an essential trace element, is present in unusually high concentrations in the chorioretinal complex relative to most other tissues. Because little has been known about the interactions between the retinal pigment epithelium and free or protein-associated zinc, we studied 65Zn uptake by human retinal pigment epithelium in vitro. When monolayers were exposed to differing concentrations fro...

A 47-year-old Japanese man had a progressive degeneration of the retina and choroid along the retinal veins associated with uveitis of two years' duration. The lesion was characteristic of paravenous retinochoroidal atrophy: a contiguous atrophy of the retinal pigment epithelium and choroid of one-half to one disc diameter in size was present along most of the veins from the posterior pole to t...

Retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) is a principal site of pathogenesis in age-related macular degeneration (AMD). AMD is a main source of vision loss even blindness in the elderly and there is no effective treatment right now. Our aim is to describe the relationship between the morphology of RPE cells and the age and genotype of the eyes. We use principal component analysis (PCA) or functional pr...