Neuroprotective Strategies for Retinal Ganglion Cell Degeneration: Current Status and Challenges Ahead

The retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) are the output cells of the retina into the brain. In mammals, these cells are not able to regenerate their axons after optic nerve injury, leaving the patients with optic neuropathies with permanent visual loss. An effective RGCs-directed therapy could provide a beneficial effect to prevent the progression of the disease. Axonal injury leads to the functional loss of RGCs and subsequently induces neuronal death, and axonal regeneration would be essential to restore the neuronal connectivity, and to reestablish the function of the visual system. The manipulation of several intrinsic and extrinsic factors has been proposed in order to stimulate axonal regeneration and functional repairing of axonal connections in the visual pathway. However, there is a missing point in the process since, until now, there is no therapeutic strategy directed to promote axonal regeneration of RGCs as a therapeutic approach for optic neuropathies.This work was supported by Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), Portugal (Fellowships PD/BD/114115/2015 and PD/BD/127821/2016, Grant PTDC/NEU-OSD/3123/2014 and Strategic Projects UID/NEU/04539/2013, UID/NEU/04539/2019, UIDP/04539/2020 and UIDB/04539/2020), FEDER-COMPETE POCI-01-0145-FEDER-016849, FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-028417, POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007440) and Centro 2020 Regional Operational Programme (CENTRO-01-0145-FEDER-000008: BrainHealth 2020). Grupos UPV/EHU GIU18/50, PUE 2018-04 and ELKARTEK KK-2019/00086 to E.V