UH College of Optometry biomedical engineer Vijaykrishna Raghunathan has received $765,000 from the National Institutes of Health to examine an understudied part of glaucoma – the ebb and flow of aqueous humor, the liquid in the eye whose regulation controls eye pressure. His work could lead to a pharmaceutical cure for the irreversible disease.
The most common form of glaucoma, called open-angle glaucoma, is typically associated with elevated intraocular pressure (IOP) due to increased resistance to outflow of the liquid through an area of tissue known as the trabecular meshwork ™. In a healthy eye, with normal resistance to elimination, the liquid is constantly being secreted and produced. In patients with glaucoma, the resistance to these secretions are increased, and the IOP is high potentially because the liquid is not flowing out normally, but rather staying inside the eye, building pressure.