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Article: Sight for sore eyes: a glaucoma gene. (gene identified that causes almost 10% of glaucoma cases)(Brief Article)
- Article from:
- Science News
- Article date:
- February 1, 1997
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1997 Science Service, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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A decade after they began studying a family plagued by an aggressive form of the eye disorder glaucoma, researchers have identified the mutant gene responsible. The scientists estimate that mutations in this gene may account for nearly 10 percent of all cases of glaucoma, including an estimated 100,000 in the United States.
"This is a treatable disease, and the hope is that this [discovery of the gene] will make it possible to find patients who need to be treated," says Val C. Sheffield of the University of Iowa College of Medicine in Iowa City.
Sheffield and his colleagues had been looking for the gene since the mid-1980s, when a glaucoma patient named Alan ...