干细胞移植治疗视网膜变性疾病的研究进展

视网膜变性疾病是一类与遗传相关的变性疾病，导致患者渐进性视觉丢失，是主要的致盲性眼病之一，其共同病理基础是视网膜光感受器细胞的变性、坏死和凋亡，然而目前尚无有效的治疗方法。细胞移植治疗是目前实验研究治疗视网膜变性疾病的主要方法之一。近年研究表明将感光前体细胞或视网膜色素上皮细胞移植到视网膜下腔或玻璃体内，可以延缓宿主感光细胞的凋亡、替代凋亡的感光细胞、挽救残存的视觉功能和修复视网膜结构。细胞移植治疗的一个很重要的问题是移植细胞的来源问题，目前主要的移植细胞来源是视网膜祖／干细胞、胚胎干细胞和诱导多潜能干细胞等。本文就干细胞移植治疗视网膜变性疾病的研究进展进行综述。

Advances in stem cell transplantation for retinal degeneration

Retinal degeneration diseases leading to the loss of the light sensitive photoreceptors are a major cause of untreatable blindness in the world. These diseases culminate in the same final common pathway , the degeneration , necrosis and apoptosis of the light-sensing photoreceptors , which causes severe or complete loss of vision. Nevertheless .there are few effective treatments to the diseases. Cell replacement therapy is one of the most promising treatment methods. Recent researches show that photoreceptor precursor cells or retinal pigmented epithelial cells . which can be transplanted into the subretinal space or vitreous , have the capacity to inhibit apoptosis of photoreceptor cells ,repair the retinal structure and restore some visual function. However, one of the most important problems is the resource of the replacement cells. Nowadays , the main resource of the replacement cells are retinal stem cells , embryonic stem cells . induced pluripotent stem cells . etc. This article reviews the recent advances in stem cells transplantation for retinal degeneration diseases.