McPherson ERI Fall 2024 InSights is out!
In the new issue of InSights you can read about Dr. Roomasa Channa’s plan to ensure broader access to diabetic retinopathy care, and learn how Dr. Karen Schloss’s lab helps us make better decisions about using colors in our work. Also included are exciting announcements about an upcoming clinical trial for retinitis pigmentosa, and the Institute’s new Grant Accelerator Program (GAP).
New research in Nature Communications from the lab of MERI PI Raunak Sinha!
Congratulations to Raunak Sinha, the McPherson ERI’s David and Nancy Walsh Family Professor, for his group’s latest publication in Nature Communications! In their article, Saha et al. show that light adaptation, our visual system’s ability to adjust its photoreceptors’ light sensitivity so that we can see over a range of light levels, varies across regions of the primate retina. More specifically, photoreceptors in the fovea, the center of the retina responsible for sharp eyesight in the center of our gaze, exhibit a weaker and slower adaptation than their counterparts in the peripheral retina, the area responsible for our blurry but fast peripheral vision. The authors found that a relative abundance of an ion channel gives rise to this regional difference in adaptation. These findings reveal unique functional specializations of the primate fovea, and advance our understanding of everyday vision and its susceptibility to damage in leading causes of blindness such as macular degeneration. You can read the full article here.
Introducing the McPherson ERI Grant Accelerator Program!
The McPherson Eye Research Institute is excited to announce our newest funding opportunity, the Grant Accelerator Program (GAP)! Supported by the Alice McPherson Endowment Fund for the Visual Sciences, the Van Vreede McPherson ERI Greatest Needs Fund, the Robert A. Brandt Macular Degeneration Fund, and additional donors to the McPherson ERI, the Grant Accelerator Program provides seed funding for innovative research that advances knowledge of the visual system in health or disease, and/or applies such knowledge to augment, protect, or restore vision or the visual experience. All GAP awards are intended to promote exploration of new ideas and generation of critical data to accelerate and strengthen subsequent grant applications to external funding organizations.
This inaugural year of the program, MERI will be offering up to six $50,000 GAP awards to support a broad range of vision research at UW-Madison, as well as one additional $50,000 AMD GAP award specifically designated for research in age-related macular degeneration (AMD). To be considered for one of these awards, you must (i) be a McPherson member at UW-Madison and (ii) be faculty, permanent principal investigators, or have limited PI status (see complete eligibility criteria here). Winners can expect to receive their award approximately 2.5 months after the application deadline, and must use their award within 12 months of receipt (unless a one year no cost extension is granted).
For more details and to apply, please visit our official GAP application webpage here.
Application Deadline: December 2nd, 2024 at 11:30pm CST
We look forward to receiving your applications!
MERI Member Akihiro Ikeda awarded NIH NEI grant
Prof. Akihiro Ikeda
Dept. of Medical Genetics, SMPH
Timothy William Trout Professor in Eye Research
Congratulations to MERI member Prof. Akihiro Ikeda (Dept. of Medical Genetics, SMPH; Timothy William Trout Professor in Eye Research) on receiving an NIH NEI grant for his project “Role of mitochondrial dynamics in rod photoreceptor cells”! Prof. Ikeda’s study will use mouse models to examine the roles of mitochondrial dynamics in retinal rod photoreceptor cells that display unique shape and arrangement of mitochondria. Overall, the research will provide novel insights into the relationship between mitochondrial form and function as well as the functional significance of mitochondrial dynamics in retinal health, and may suggest novel therapeutic strategies for retinal conditions associated with mitochondrial abnormalities.
Preliminary data for this grant was supported by the McPherson ERI’s Grant Summit Program, a program created specifically to increase support for UW-Madison vision research by facilitating successful resubmissions of competitive federal grant applications.
Notice of MERI Trainee Award Opportunity: David G. Walsh Travel Awards
The McPherson Eye Research Institute is pleased to announce that we are now accepting submissions for our Fall 2024 David G. Walsh Travel Awards! Made possible by the David G. Walsh Research Fellowship Fund, these $1500 awards provide support for MERI trainees to present at and attend conferences in their field. The deadline to submit applications is Friday, October 11th, 2024. Visit here for further information and to apply!
Notice of MERI Trainee Award Opportunity: Kenzi Valentyn Vision Research Award
The McPherson Eye Research Institute is pleased to announce that we are now accepting submissions for our 2024 Kenzi Valentyn Vision Research Awards! Made possible by our annual Cycle for Sight event, these $7500 awards are offered each year to advance vision research in McPherson ERI member labs, to augment trainee’s professional development and to provide trainees with grant writing experience. Typically, four to five awards are given each fall. The deadline to submit applications is Friday, October 25th, 2024. Visit here for further information and to apply!
MERI Research Committee member Andreas Velten wins SIGGRAPH’s 2024 Test of Time Award
Andreas Velten, PhD, Associate Professor of Biostatistics and Medical Informatics, has received a 2024 Test of Time award from SIGGRAPH, the international meeting on graphics research. The award, which was for Velten’s 2013 research paper titled Femto-Photography: Capturing and Visualizing the Propagation of Light, is given to authors of earlier SIGGRAPH meeting papers that have had a significant and lasting impact on computer graphics and interactive techniques over at least a decade.
McPherson ERI Director David Gamm on Wisconsin Public Radio’s The Larry Meiller Show
Prof. David Gamm, Director of the McPherson Eye Research Institute, recently appeared on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Larry Meiller Show to discuss the latest research on and treatments for macular degeneration, glaucoma, optic nerve damage, and to field questions from callers on eye health. You can hear the full broadcast here.
Wisconsin State Journal features story on latest Vision Gallery exhibition
The May 6th edition of the Wisconsin State Journal features an article on Sight Beyond Vision, the latest exhibition at the McPherson ERI’s Mandelbaum & Albert Family Vision Gallery! This show, which is a collaboration between MERI and Arts for All Wisconsin, brings together work by Wisconsin artists with low vision. You can read the full article on the Wisconsin State Journal website or by clicking the thumbnail to the right.
You also still have time to check out the exhibition from now until May 31, 2024. More details on the show, its artists, and gallery location/hours can be found here.
McPherson ERI Spring 2024 InSights is out!
The new issue of InSights includes an extended piece on iPSC-derived retinal cell therapeutics and their road to clinical trials; a look at a MERI member’s work to develop new methods to assess vision in dogs; a snapshot of four MERI awardees in the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences who are researching Retinitis Pigmentosa, Age-related Macular Degeneration, and Glaucoma; a list of our 2024 Kenzi Valentyn Award winners; images from the Mandelbaum & Albert Family Vision Gallery Sight Beyond Limits exhibit and a preview of our next exhibit Birds’ Eye Views.
MERI member Colleen McDowell awarded R21 grant
Prof. Colleen McDowell,
Dept of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences
Congratulations to MERI member Prof. Colleen McDowell (Dept of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences, SMPH) on receiving an NIH R21 grant for her project “Optic nerve head cellular interactions in response to mechanical strain and fibrosis”! This multi-PI grant is a collaboration with Dr. Preethi Ganapathy (Dept of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences, SUNY Upstate Medical University) that aims to understand how and to what extent ONH cells signal to each other to produce matrix fibrosis in response to mechanical strains in glaucomatous damage. In their exploratory R21, McDowell and Ganapathy propose to overcome the limitations of existing models by establishing an in vitro 3D culture system that accounts for native tissue stiffness, permits dynamic matrix remodeling, and allows for targeted manipulation of cell type-specific molecular pathways.
Preliminary data for this grant was supported by the McPherson ERI’s Grant Summit Program, a program created specifically to increase support for UW–Madison vision research by facilitating successful resubmissions of competitive federal grant applications.
News story in Nature Nanotechnology features work of McPherson ERI member Shaoqin Gong
Recently published original research by Prof. Shaoqin Gong (Retina Research Foundation Edwin and Dorothy Gamewell Professor, Dept of Biomedical Engineering; Dept of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences) and colleagues has just been featured in Nature Nanotechnology’s News and Views. The work, which aims to develop a method for overcoming antibiotic resistance, uses multimodal nanoparticles to target bacterial defence mechanisms while enhancing innate immune response. The research promises to advance therapies for ocular infections, as the focus pathogen in this work, Staphylococcus aureus, is a common bacteria found in such infections.
You can read the news story here, and the published research by Zhu et al. here.
Congratulations to Grant Summit Award winner Dr. Akihiro Ikeda!
Dr. Akihiro Ikeda (Timothy William Trout Professor in Eye Research, Dept of Medical Genetics) is the latest recipient of our MERI Grant Summit Program (GSP) Award! The GSP award was designed to facilitate successful resubmissions of federal grant applications. Dr. Ikeda will use his award to generate further preliminary data in preparation for the resubmission of his NIH BDE grant application Role of mitochondrial dynamics in rod photoreceptor cells.
You can learn more about the GSP award opportunity here.
The McPherson ERI and the UW-Madison Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences (DOVS) are in the process of hiring a faculty member with a research program in AMD! The position lists PhD, MD, or MD/PhD as qualifications and at least 50% of their effort must be related to AMD research. The tenure home would be in DOVS. The link to the job posting can be found here.
To all vision researchers, please inform your colleagues who might be qualified and interested of this opportunity!
Announcing our Spring 2024 Walsh Travel Award Winners!
The McPherson Eye Research Institute is pleased to announce our Spring 2024 Walsh Research Travel Award recipients! Made possible by the David G. Walsh endowment, these travel awards provide support for MERI trainees to attend and present vision-related research at a professional conference or symposium. This semester, the MERI Research and Leadership Committees have selected the following two trainees to receive this $1500 award:
David Barnett, Postdoctoral Researcher
(Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences, UW-Madison; Freya Mowat, mentor)
David will attend the ARVO 2024 annual meeting in Seattle, WA in May of 2024. David’s presentation will be entitled “Pgc1a haploinsufficiency causes functional retinal deficits in aged mice.”
Carter Sifferman, Graduate Student
(Computer Sciences, UW-Madison
Michael Gleicher & Mohit Gupta, mentor)
Carter will attend The 2024 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) in Yokohama, Japan in May 2024. Carter’s presentation will be entitled “Unlocking the Performance of Proximity Sensors by Utilizing Transient Histograms.”
Congratulations to MERI member Shawn Green!
Prof. Shawn Green (Dept of Psychology) is one of 24 faculty winners of the 2024-25 Vilas Associates competition! The competition recognizes “new and ongoing research of the highest quality and significance” being undertaken by faculty within 20 years of their tenure date.
Join Us for Cycle for Sight 2024!
Cycle for Sight 2024 kicks off at the Princeton Club on Saturday, March 16th. The Princeton Club event is full, but you can still register, on your own or with a team, to walk or bike through April as part of Cycle for Sight! And you can always donate to support the event and support vision research at UW-Madison.
Spotting Cognitive Impairment Early
New research from McPherson ERI member Natascha Merten (Assistant Professor, Department of Population Health Sciences, SMPH) indicates that testing senses and motor skills in midlife may help predict cognitive impairment.
Congratulations to the winners of our 2023 Walsh Graduate Student Support Initiative Award!
It is our pleasure to announce the recipients of our 2023 David G. Walsh Graduate Student Support Initiative (GSSI) Award! Made possible by the David G. Walsh Research Fellowship Endowment Fund, GSSI provides McPherson ERI members 1-year grants of $12,000 to support the work of a graduate student. This year’s award recipients are Professor Gillian McLellan (Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences; Surgical Sciences) and Professor Ari Rosenberg (Neuroscience). Prof. McLellan’s GSSI award will support graduate student Virginia Mathu’s work on her thesis project Disease Mechanisms at the Intersection of Glaucoma and Alzheimer’s Disease, while Prof. Rosenberg’s GSSI award will support graduate student Zikang ‘John’ Zhu’s work on his thesis project Causal contributions of parieto-occipital cortex to 3D visual perception.
Congratulations to the winners of our 2023 Distinguished Paper Award!
It is our pleasure to announce the recipients of our 2023 Distinguished Paper Award. This year, the McPherson ERI honored 5 trainees for their outstanding, published vision research.
This year’s winners will be recognized during a short ceremony at our upcoming 2024 MERI-at-a-Glance event (Friday, February 23rd). Further information on them and their papers can be found here.
Dr. Freya Mowat’s research featured in UW News
Freya Mowat
Ever wonder what kind of TV shows your dog might choose if they could work the remote control? If so, check out this UW-Madison News article on McPherson ERI Member Freya Mowat’s research on canine vision. Prof. Mowat’s study, which began 2 years ago, focuses on uncovering the factors influencing dogs’ interest in interacting with video content. Ultimately, the study’s goal is to support development of more sensitive ways to assess canine vision.
UW News features new research by MERI member Anjon Audhya and his team
Sites (red) in a mammalian cell where COPII facilitates the packaging of various proteins.
Anjon Audhya
Coat Protein Complex II (COPII) is an enormously important protein that is responsible for transporting approximately one third of all proteins that function in mammalian cells. In a recently published paper in Nature Communication, the Audhya team describes how, using genome editing and live cell imaging, they were able to identify that a single protein called Sec23 is a central regulator of COPII. This significantly advances our understanding of COPII, and could eventually help researchers to develop new treatments for diseases like cancer, diabetes and those that cause immune dysfunction. Read the full story here.
Congratulations to the recipients of our 2023 AMD, RP, and Glaucoma & Optic Neuropathies Awards!
It is our pleasure to announce the recipients of our second Age-related Macular Degeneration (AMD) and Retinitis Pigmentosa (RP) Awards competition, as well as the recipient of our very first Glaucoma and Optic Neuropathies Award competition. This year, Prof. Nader Sheibani and Assistant Prof. Ismail Zaitoun have won our two AMD Awards, Prof. Kimberly Stepien has won the RP Award, and Prof. Rob Nickells has won the Glaucoma & Optic Neuropathies Award. Each will receive $50,000 of research support over the course of the coming calendar year.
For more information on the winners and their proposals, see the AMD/RP Awards recipient page and the Glaucoma & Optic Neuropathies Award recipient page.
Gamm lab research featured in UW’s Science stories that stood out on campus in 2023
Research by MERI Director David Gamm’s laboratory has made the list of standout UW-Madison research in 2023! You can find more information about this work on lab-grown retinal cells here and in this article by Ludwig et al. published in Cell Reports.
Congratulations to our 2023 Kenzi Valentyn Vision Research Award Winners!
It is our pleasure to announce that Theo Bucci, Bikalpa Ghimire, Jake Khoussine, Michele Salzman, and Tania Sharmin are our 2023 Kenzi Valentyn Vision Research Grant recipients! These one-year grants of $7500 each are funded by the Institute’s annual Cycle for Sight event, which raises money to support research in McPherson ERI member labs and programs. Thanks to the generosity of our donors, led by the Valentyn family, we were able to continue to fund five Kenzi Valentyn awards this year! More information on the winners and their projects can be found here.
New MERI-funded research just published in Cell Reports
Congratulations to McPherson ERI members Ari Rosenberg and Lowell W. Thompson on their recent publication ‘Hierarchical computation of 3D motion across macaque areas MT and FST! This paper, which was published yesterday in Cell Reports, reveals that the macaque middle temporal (MT) area is largely specialized for processing 2D retinal motion and the neighboring fundus of the superior temporal sulcus (FST) contains a prominent representation of 3D motion. It also shows how behaviorally relevant motion representations can be computed from ambiguous retinal signals.
This work was made possible by two MERI awards: The Expanding Our Vision Award (awarded to Ari Rosenberg) and the Walsh Graduate Student Support Initiative Award (awarded to Lowell Thompson) in 2020. This same support also enabled these researchers to obtain an R01 from the National Eye Institute this same year!
Prof. Ari Rosenberg
Lowell W. Thompson
Congratulations to the winners of our 2023 Vision Sciences Poster Presentation Competition!
Graduate student Jake Khoussine won this year’s Vision Sciences Poster Presentation Competition with his poster “Retinal output dysfunction in a model of congenital stationary night blindness”. Graduate student Michele Salzman and Research intern Anoushka Kuckreja took home Honorable Mentions this year. Special thanks to both Nikon and the University Bookstore for supplying prizes for this year’s competition!
Inaugural Daniel M. Albert Lecture
The inaugural Daniel M. Albert Lecture was held at the Health Sciences Learning Center on Thursday, October 26th, with McPherson ERI Founding Director Daniel Albert in attendance. The annual lecture was endowed by Dr. Alice McPherson—Dr. Albert’s partner in launching the McPherson Eye Research Institute—in honor of Dr. Albert’s accomplished career in retina. At Dr. Albert’s request, the inaugural lecture was given by MERI Director David Gamm, MD, PhD, who spoke on Overcoming Challenges to Photoreceptor Cell Replacement. Dr. Albert’s colleagues were pleased to greet him at a reception preceding the lecture, and a dinner following.
McPherson ERI Fall 2023 InSights is out!
The new issue of InSights includes an extended look at the MERI-centric gene editing collaboration that recently received a $29 million NIH grant to launch the CRISPR Vision Program; a look at the work of three MERI members in the Department of Kinesiology; an introduction to some of our new trainee members; and images from the Mandelbaum & Albert Family Vision Gallery exhibit, The Soul in Things.
Trout AMD Project Kicks Off in Appleton
The McPherson ERI welcomed close to 200 attendees to a research update on age-related macular degeneration (AMD) in Appleton on Saturday morning, September 23rd. Held on the campus of Lawrence University, the talks – by David Gamm, Aki Ikeda, Amitha Domalpally, and Michael Altaweel – kicked off the Trout AMD Project, an accelerated effort to develop new therapies for AMD. Kapil Bharti of the National Eye Institute delivered the inaugural Sandra Lemke Trout Lecture, which was followed by an enthusiastic Q & A session. You can find more photos of the event here.
Notice of *NEW* Award Opportunity for MERI Members: Glaucoma and Optic Neuropathies Award
The McPherson Eye Research Institute is pleased to announce an exciting new funding opportunity: The Glaucoma and Optic Neuropathies Research Award! Made possible by an anonymous donor’s generous gift, this competitive award provides $50,000 to advance research on either glaucoma or optic neuropathies and thereby expands our pilot awards program (which includes our AMD and RP awards) to a total of $200,000 of annual research funding! The deadline to submit applications is Sunday, November 5th, 2023.
To be considered for this award, you must (i) be a McPherson ERI member at UW–Madison and (ii) be faculty, a permanent principal investigator, or have limited PI status (see complete eligibility criteria here). Those interested in learning more about this award opportunity can visit our Glaucoma and Optic Neuropathies Award webpage for more details and to download an application.
Notice of Award Opportunity for MERI Members: AMD/RP Awards
The McPherson Eye Research Institute is pleased to announce this Fall semester’s application opportunity for our AMD/RP Awards! Supported by the generosity of Roger and Lynn Van Vreede and by the Robert A. Brandt Macular Degeneration Fund, these competitive, annual awards are intended to advance research on age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and retinitis pigmentosa (RP). This year, the McPherson ERI is offering two $50,000 awards to advance AMD research and one $50,000 award to advance RP research. The deadline to submit applications is Monday, October 23rd, 2023.
To be considered for this award, you must (i) be a McPherson ERI member at UW–Madison and (ii) be faculty, a permanent principal investigator, or have limited PI status (see complete eligibility criteria here). Those interested in learning more about this award opportunity can visit our AMD / RP Research Awards webpage for more details.
Computational tool helps uncover gene networks of cell fate
A recently published study from the Wisconsin Institute of Discovery (WID), titled Inference of cell type-specific gene regulatory networks on cell lineages from single cell omic datasets integrates both computational and biological sciences by using machine learning to better understand the driving forces of cellular identity. Specifically, WID member and professor Sushmita Roy and her lab used single-cell Multi-Task Network Inference (scMTNI) to detect gene regulatory networks responsible for cell type transitions. Full article
Keywords Gene regulatory networks(GRNs), cellular reprogramming, machine learning, single-cell omics, single-cell Multi-Task Network Inference (scMTNI)
Nonviral base editing of KCNJ13 mutation preserves vision in a model of inherited retinal channelopathy
We are pleased to announce that a new study, with contributions by several MERI members, has just been published in The Journal of Clinical Investigation! The paper, entitled ‘Nonviral base editing of KCNJ13 mutation preserves vision in a model of inherited retinal channelopathy’, provides a preclinical validation of targeted ion channel functional rescue, reinforcing the effectiveness of nonviral genome editing therapy for rare inherited disorders.
Keywords: Gene editing, nanoparticles, nonviral delivery, KCNJ13 loss-of-function nonsense mutation, 61 Kir7.1 ion channel, Leber congenital amaurosis 16 (LCA16), inherited retinal degeneration, induced 62 pluripotent stem cell-derived retinal pigment epithelium (iPSC-RPE)
Emerging Technologies at UW-Madison Get Boost from State Funds
Emerging technologies developed at UW–Madison will receive funding assistance as the result of an on-campus grant program administered by UW–Madison’s Discovery to Product (D2P) and a matching grant of $300,000 from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC). One project that is being funded by these programs is that of MERI member Sanbrita Mondal, who will work with Sensify, Inc. to develop a non-invasive workflow to screen for early-stage Alzheimer’s disease.
Full article
Research Beyond Waisman Center: Discoveries that have spun into products
Multiple discoveries born from the minds and hard work of Waisman Center investigators have left the nest to become successful companies or products that have had a significant impact in the world through translational research. Included is the work of McPherson ERI Director, Dr. David Gamm, who has contributed to advancements in treating ocular diseases. Full article
Faculty receive 2023-24 WARF Named Professorships, Kellett Fellowships, and Romnes Awards
Thirty-five of the University of Wisconsin-Madison faculty have been awarded fellowships from the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research and Graduate Education for 2023-24. The awardees span the four divisions on campus: arts and humanities, physical sciences, social sciences and biological sciences. Full article
Faculty members of MERI awarded these fellowships include Kevin Eliceiri, Kris Saha, Jill Casid, and Xinyu Zhao. Congratulations to all awardees!
From left to right: Kevin Eliceiri, Kris Saha, Jill Casid, Xinyu Zhao.
McPherson ERI Consortium Receives $29 Million NIH Grant to Advance Gene Editing Techniques
Using several innovative delivery methods, the new consortium – including researchers Krishanu Saha, Sarah Gong, David Gamm, Bikash Pattnaik and T. Michael Nork – will move ahead with gene editing techniques to treat two rare blinding diseases, Best disease and Leber congenital amaurosis (LCA). Read more.
McPherson ERI’s Spring 2023 InSights is out!
Our Spring 2023 newsletter reviews the extraordinary career of Dr. Alice McPherson; announces the new Trout AMD Project; and highlights a new $30 million NIH grant to MERI members to advance gene editing therapies for two devastating eye diseases./>
Dr Freya Mowat receives the Dr. Joe G. Hollyfield New Investigator Award for Macular Degeneration Research
The highly prestigious award is presented annually by the BrightFocus Foundation to the top-rated New Investigator Grant recipient in recognition of exceptionally promising and forward-thinking ideas in the field of age-related macular degeneration. Dr. Mowat holds a joint faculty position as an Assistant Professor in both the Department of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences and the School of Veterinary Medicine. Read more.
______________
Cycle for Sight 2023 surpasses last year’s total!
Cycle for Sight 2023, the McPherson Eye Research Institute’s annual fundraiser, raised $60,000 this year. Teams participated both at our kickoff event on March 25th at the Princeton Club (which went very well in spite of a snowstorm!), and in the community.
As always, you can continue to donate to Cycle for Sight from anywhere in the world!
Cycle for Sight supports the Kenzi Valentyn Vision Research Awards, whose Fall 2022 recipients were announced recently. Also, check out our 2022 annual report to read about McPherson ERI research highlights from the past year.
We’re very grateful to our sponsors, Opsis Therapeutics and the Princeton Club!
New Nanocapsules Deliver Therapy Brain-Wide, Edit Alzheimer’s Gene in Mice
Gene therapies have the potential to treat neurological disorders like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, but they face a common barrier — the blood-brain barrier. Now, researchers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison have developed a way to move therapies across the brain’s protective membrane to deliver brain-wide therapy with a range of biological medications and treatments.
Shaoqin “Sarah” Gong, PhD, has developed nanocapsules that can deliver CRISPR genome editors past the blood-brain barrier, and is aiming to treat various types of retinitis pigmentosa — another advance from McPherson ERI scientists.
The McPherson Eye Research Institute is pleased to announce this year’s recipient of the third annual David G. Walsh Graduate Student Support Initiative (GSSI) award. The GSSI provides a 1-year grant of $12,000, financed by the David G. Walsh Research Fellowship Endowment Fund, to a McPherson ERI member to support the work of a graduate student.
Awardee: Principal Investigator Freya Mowat, BVsc, PhD, DECVO, DACVO, MRCVS (Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences, SMPH; Surgical Sciences, VetMed)
Funding will support the thesis work of PhD candidate Michele Salzman. Michele’s thesis focuses on The Effects of Cadmium Exposure on the Retina in Outbred and Laboratory Animal Species.
Now in the Mandelbaum & Albert Family Vision Gallery: Envisioning the Environment – Scenes from Plein Air Artists, featuring works from twelve Wisconsin artists. Stop by to view scenes from all seasons, captured outdoors in settings local and far away, to brighten our days and engage our imaginations.
McPherson ERI 2022 AMD & RP Research Awards
With funding provided by generous gifts from Roger and Lynn Van Vreede and from the Robert A. Brandt Macular Degeneration Fund, the McPherson ERI Leadership Committee is pleased to announce two awards of $50,000 each to advance research in age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and one award of $50,000 to advance research in retinitis pigmentosa (RP).
Sushmita Roy, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Biostatistics & Medical Informatics, Wisconsin Institute for Discovery, for High Resolution Characterization of Photoreceptor Populations in Cell-Based Therapy.
Akihiro Ikeda, DVM, PhD, Professor, Department of Medical Genetics, for Lipidomic Analysis of Age-Related Macular Degeneration Patients.
Mrinalini Hoon, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, for Understanding How Connections Between Inner Retinal Neurons are Altered During Retinitis Pigmentosa.
Congratulations on behalf of the Leadership Committee!
The McPherson Eye Research Institute is pleased to announce six recipients of the first annual McPherson ERI Distinguished Paper Award: Kristina Chern, Ray Doudlah, Vishnu Lokhande, and Steven Mayerl, Philip Myzk, and Aindrila Saha. Funded by Cycle for Sight, this award recognizes the outstanding work of our trainees and the breadth and depth of research conducted by Institute member laboratories.
**Prizes will be awarded in a brief ceremony to be held at the upcoming MERI-At-A-Glance event on Friday, February 24, 2023. (Registration for MERI-At-A Glance will open soon.)
Lab-grown Retinal Cells Make Successful Connections….
Successful connections between several types of dish-grown retinal cells were established in the lab, according to a paper published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The paper, a collaboration between the Gamm Lab (co-first-authors Allison Ludwig and Steven Mayerl) and Xinyu Zhao, PhD, is an essential step in moving toward human clinical trials to treat blindness. These results follow several important findings along this pathway in 2022.
McPherson Eye Research Institute is pleased to announce the Fall 2022 Kenzi Valentyn Vision Research Grant recipients. These one-year grants of $7500 each are funded by the Institute’s annual Cycle for Sight event, which raises money to support research in McPherson ERI member labs and programs.
David Barnett, MD, mentor Michelle Ciucci, PhD / Freya Mowat, BVSc, PhD, Surgery: Translational Visual System Biomarkers in a Mouse Model of Parkinson Disease
Mason Shipley, mentor Donna Neumann, PhD, Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences: In Vivo Knockdown of HSV-1 Latency Associated Transcripts for Prevention of Recurrent Viral Ocular Disease
Praveen Susaimanickam, PhD, mentor David Gamm, MD, PhD, Waisman Center, Identification and Utilization of Selective Cell Surface Markers for Human Cone Photoreceptor Isolation and Transplantation
Serena Wisner, mentor Mrinalini Hoon, PhD, Neuroscience Training Program, Role of Photoreceptor Input for Synapse Formation Across Inner Retinal Neurons
Ruosen “Alex” Xie, PhD, mentor Shaoqin “Sarah” Gong, PhD, Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, Developing Non-Viral Vectors for Gene Therapy in the Retina
Kenzi Valentyn Vision Research Awards, the McPherson Eye Research Institute’s annual research grant opportunity for trainees, were established in 2017. They are named after Kenzi Valentyn, in honor of her courage and positive attitude throughout her long battle with Kearns–Sayre syndrome, a degenerative disease with symptoms including vision loss, which ended with her passing at age 30 in March 2017. Her many friends and family members, including her parents Tim and Nancy, brothers Brett and Connor, and sister-in-law Mackenzie, have ridden in Cycle for Sight as “Kenzi’s Team” since 2014. The McPherson ERI is sincerely grateful for the Valentyn family’s dedication to vision research.
Past News Article Archive
Events
Vision at the Biotech (June 1st, 2024)
12th Annual Alice McPherson Lecture
(June 6th, 2024)
2nd Annual Sandra Lemke Trout Lecture
(September 13, 2024)
2024 Visiting Scholar Lecture
(September 26th, 2024)
16th Annual Vision Science Symposium: Poster Session & Distinguished Lecture
(October 25, 2024)
2nd Annual Daniel M. Albert Lecture
(November 14, 2024)
Vision Gallery
Changes periodically
Cycle for Sight 2024
Kickoff on March 16, 2024
Dr. Monroe Trout
Dr. Monroe Eugene Trout, Sr. (1931-2024)
The McPherson ERI notes with sorrow the passing of Dr. Monroe Trout, an Honorary Advisory Board member, supporter, and friend of the Institute since 2013. Alongside his wife Sandra, Dr. Trout has been instrumental in helping the McPherson ERI grow over the past decade, and in giving an outstanding impetus to macular degeneration research at the Institute.
Apart from their steadfast support of vision science and commitment to curing blinding diseases, the philanthropic efforts of Dr. Trout and his wife have had an incalculable impact on people and institutions both within and outside the state of Wisconsin. Their rich legacy of aiding those in need will continue to extend far into the future.
Dr. Trout lived a full, generous, and meaningful life, and will be missed by his McPherson ERI friends and by many others.
Remembering Dr. Alice McPherson
With great sadness, the McPherson ERI notes the passing on January 16th, 2023, of our namesake and co-founder, Dr. Alice R. McPherson. Dr. McPherson’s many remarkable achievements are profiled on our website and are honored in the Spring 2023 issue of our InSights newsletter. Her effects on the McPherson Eye Research Institute and UW-Madison, on many other institutions, and on so many patients and researchers around the world, are incalculable.
