AMES, Iowa - An Iowa State University researcher has been named
one of the lead investigators and head of animal research for
the United States Veterans Affairs Center for the Prevention
and Treatment of Visual Loss.
Dr. Sinisa Grozdanic, assistant professor at Iowa State
University's College of Veterinary Medicine, will lead
ISU's efforts as part of a $5 million federal grant -- $1
million each for the next five years -- that will focus on
preventing and curing visual impairments.
The VA-funded center comprises researchers from Iowa State
University; the VA Medical Center, Iowa City; the University of
Iowa and other leading institutions from around the nation.
They will focus on visual impairments caused by traumatic brain
and optic nerve injury, treatment of visual loss due to chronic
neurodegenerative diseases and an advanced telemedical
detection of eye disease. Telemedical detection uses computer
assessments and three-dimensional imaging.
This is the first such center for translational medicine at
Iowa State that is funded by federal dollars, according to
Grozdanic.
Translational medicine - taking what you learn from one species
and applying it to others - is a focus that Grozdanic believes
will be helpful.
"It is part of a one-medicine principle," Grozdanic
said. "Successful treatments in animal patients are
frequently the very first step towards new treatments in human
patients. Many of the treatments and solutions are the same,
which further highlights the fact that we are not so different
from our animal patients. Sometimes the only difference is that
my patients just have four legs.""
Joining Grozdanic from Iowa State University will be Matt
Harper, Anumantha Kanthasamy and Tatjana Lazic, all from the
College of Veterinary Medicine; and Don Sakaguchi from the
department of genetics, development and cell biology.
The overall program will be directed by Dr. Randy Kardon, who
is affiliated with the Iowa City Veterans Administration
Medical Center and also director of neuro-ophthalmology and
professor of ophthalmology and visual sciences at the U of I
Carver College of Medicine. At the UI, Kardon also holds the
Pomerantz Family Chair in Ophthalmology and is a retinal
specialist with the Iowa City VAMC. The associate director of
the center is Dr. Michael Abramoff, associate professor of
ophthalmology at the VA and the U of I. Seventeen additional
doctors and researchers from the UI will also be part of the
center, along with nine additional collaborators from around
the country.
"It's a great opportunity to bring all these people
together under the same umbrella," said Grozdanic.
"We have common objectives, common goals, and since we are
working together on these problems, it guarantees that success
is much more likely and will come much faster."
The Center for the Prevention and Treatment of Visual Loss will
be located in a new VA Medical Center research building that is
currently under construction in Iowa City. Translational animal
studies will be performed at Iowa State University.
Many researchers associated with the new center have worked
together in the past.
"We've been extremely successful as a group of people
who have collaborated on individual projects," he said.
"There was a need to put everyone in a collaborative group
working together and sharing ideas, so development of new
treatments for blinding disease can be accelerated."
The VA hopes to learn how to prevent and treat visual
impairments in older veterans caused by age. In younger
veterans, visual loss is more often caused by trauma or nerve
damage, and the VA hopes to learn how to avoid and treat these
causes, too.
Grozdanic hopes his work with animals will be a key part of the
research.
"Since the life span of a majority of animal species is
much shorter than a human's, you see progression of
diseases much faster. You can also see effectiveness of the
therapy much faster," he said. "It is a very good
translational step before applying the same approach to human
patients."