Medical College of Wisconsin Ocular Gene Therapy Laboratory 2019 News
2019 News
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November 22, 2019 Congratulations – Erica Shaw passes her qualifying exam Erica Shaw, a second-year graduate in the neuroscience doctoral program (NDP), successfully passed her qualifying exam in front of a committee consisting of Drs Daniel M. Lipinski DPhil, Brian A. Link PhD, Joseph Besharse, PhD and Alison Ebert PhD. Erica will continue to work on developing gene therapy treatments for age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the leading cause of blindness in the elderly. |
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August 12, 2019 Service – Dr. Lipinski joins the editorial board of Scientific Reports Dr. Lipinski has been invited to serve as an Editorial Board Member for the journal Scientific Reports, an ‘open-access, multidisciplinary’ journal published by Nature Research. |
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June 11, 2019 Publication – OGTL collaborative research is published in Cell reports In collaboration with Dr. Ron Gregg, study leader and Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Louisville, OGTL researchers helped explore the synaptic connectivity between rod photoreceptors and depolarizing bipolar cells. For this study, OGTL researchers generated rAAV vectors capable of expressing Lrit3, a protein implicated in night blindness, specifically in rod photoreceptors following intravitreal injection. Injection of the Lrit3 expressing rAAV vector in knockout mice resulted in the rescue of post-synaptic TRPM1 expression and partial restoration of electrophysiological function. Read the full article |
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May 5th, 2019 Service – Dr. Lipinski appointed to American Society of Gene and Cell Therapy (ASGCT) committee Dr. Lipinski has been invited to serve a three-year term (05/2019 – 05/2022) as a member of the Viral Gene Transfer Vectors Committee of the America Society of Gene and Cell Therapy (ASGCT) and will serve as co-chair of the ‘Vector Development, Clinical Implementation and Corporate Connections’ symposium at the 2020 Annual Meeting, held in Boston, MA. |
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April 16, 2019 Congratulations - Dwani Patel accepted to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Dwani Patel, a second year MD-PhD student, has been accepted as a student on a prestigious course at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory entitled ‘Vision: a platform for linking circuits, behaviour & perception’, which runs from June 11-26. Dwani received partial funding to attend the course through the National Institute of Health. |
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February 06, 2019 Welcome – Erika Shaw joins the OGTL as a graduate student Erika Shaw, a first year graduate student in the Neuroscience Doctoral Program (NDP), has elected to join the Lipinski Laboratory full time to complete her graduate studies. Erika has an interest in age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and will be working to develop gene therapy treatments to prevent loss of retinal pigment epithelial (RPE) cells in the early geographic disease state. |
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February 01, 2019 Publication – OGTL collaborative research is featured on the American Journal of Pathology (AJP) front cover In collaboration with Dr. Jeffery A. Medin, study leader and MACC Fund Professor, researchers from the OGTL, AOIP and Kassem Laboratory at the MCW Eye Institute, helped characterize the effects of acid ceramidase deficiency on ocular anatomy and function in a mouse model of Farber’s disease, a hyper-rare lysosomal storage disorder of which there has been fewer than 200 reported cases. Introduction of the patient-derived Asah1P361R/P361R mutation in the Farber mouse model was observed to result in catastrophic developmental and functional abnormalities, including complete vision loss. Read the full article |
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January 11, 2019 Welcome – Ramesh Periasamy joins OGTL as a post-doctoral fellow Dr. Ramesh Periasamy obtained his doctoral degree (PhD) in biomedical sciences from the University of Bern, Switzerland, and joins the OGTL from the laboratory of Dr. Hamant Kanna, University of Massachusetts. Dr. Periasamy is an expert in stem cell biology and will be working alongside Dr. Lipinski to develop novel platforms for studying the development and treatment of diabetic retinopathy, in addition to exploring strategies to restore vision in patients who have lost sight. |
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January 10, 2019 Grant – Glaucoma Research Foundation Dr. Lipinski and the Ocular Gene Therapy Laboratory (OGTL) have been awarded a Shaffer Grant from the Glaucoma Research Foundation entitled ‘Development of rAAV vector technologies to facilitate topical gene delivery to the cornea’. The one-year, $50,000 grant will support preliminary studies aimed at developing a single-use, contact lens-based gene delivery system capable of modifying cells of the cornea. If successful, this technology is anticipated to have implications for the treatment of glaucoma, as well as other corneal disorders. |