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Tom Glaser, M.D., Ph.D.

In keeping with its mission to restore sight by any means possible, Midwest Eye-Banks offered eye and vision researchers a landmark $197,400 in 2008 for the 2008-09 fiscal year. This funding, which is nearly double the amount awarded in previous years, provided seed money to a dozen promising research projects, and also included five stipends awarded to university students in New Jersey, Illinois and Michigan.

The Eye-Bank supports eye and vision research to offer help and hope for those whose blindness can’t be reversed through corneal transplantation. Grant recipients are selected after careful project review by Midwest Eye-Banks’ prestigious Research Review Committee, comprised of volunteer members of the medical and academic community, many of whom have previously served on National Institute of Health Study Sections to review NIH grant applications. These respected scientists donate their time and expertise to review each proposal in detail, ensuring that any Eye-Bank funding will be used appropriately and that the proposals carry sufficient scientific merit.

“I think the committee members work together quite harmoniously,” says Dr. Peter Ward, who has been an active participant in the Research Review Committee since its inception in 1980. “Each grant gets at least two reviewers, then it’s discussed at the (annual) meeting.”

According to Ward, the board is usually in consensus about who should receive grant funding.

When reviewing grant applications, committee members look for research projects that are both feasible and original. They also take the researchers’ background and experience into account, ensuring that the researcher has both the technical ability and access to appropriate resources to carry out the proposed project. Above all, they look for the projects that have the best chance of gaining NIH funding and contributing to the restoration of sight.

Because the Eye-Bank’s grants are significantly smaller than NIH grants, the Research Review Committee doesn’t expect the same amount of preliminary data necessary to qualify for an NIH grant. In fact, in many cases, Midwest Eye-Banks’ grants help fund research aimed at gathering data for NIH grants.

“The expectation of the review committee is that a significant number (of researchers) will use their grants to gather data for NIH grants,” says Ward. “Sometimes this is the only way to fund the cost of doing preliminary studies.”

Grant recipient Dr. Tom Glaser, who works at University of Michigan Medical School, echoes Ward’s sentiment. “Grant money is hard to come by these days, particularly in the early stages,” he says.

Glaser’s research, which received Eye-Bank Grant Funding in 2008, is an effort to identify a gene that can cause Microphthalmia-Anophthalmia-Coloboma (MAC) disorders, which result in the eye being small (Microphthalmia), missing (Anophthalmia) or clefted (Coloboma).

Glaser and his colleague, Dr. Christine Nelson, have identified a family that seems to have a genetic predisposition to MAC disorders. Two children in the family – second-cousins – are affected, and twelve family members have been identified as carriers. Complicating their search for a cause is the fact that some people seem to have the mutated gene, but don’t have any outward expression of it.

New technology allows Glaser and his team to examine 6,000 DNA markers from all 12 carriers of the mutated gene on a single slide. From these markers, they’ve narrowed their focus to 40 genes.

As his research progresses, Glaser plans to test other patients from different families.

Once the gene is identified, Glaser and his staff can attempt to figure out why the gene mutation affects some people, but not others. Glaser believes it may be a combination of genetics and some external factor, such as the environment, or the gene itself could be a receptor for a vitamin that aids in eye development. The gene’s expression and the severity of the condition could also be dependent upon which parent passes along the mutated gene.

The research funded by his grant from Midwest Eye-Banks has allowed Glaser to gather enough data to apply for an NIH grant. Based on the score given to his application –“Genetic Basis of Congenital Anophthalmia” – he expects to be approved for funding when the National Eye Institute meets in January to set its budget for the next year. If approved, funding from the NIH would start in April.

Glaser is appreciative of the support given to his research by Midwest Eye-Banks.

“I’m very grateful for the funding,” he says. “It means a lot, and it means a lot to the families, too.”

In addition to the research projects that received grants, five $2,000 stipends were awarded to students involved in eye and vision research at the New Jersey Medical School , University of Illinois Chicago , the University of Michigan and Wayne State University .

Midwest Eye-Banks has awarded $2.5 million in seed money grants since its Eye and Vision Research Program began in 1980. Over the years, this funding has led to important scientific findings, including the discovery of a gene that, if defective, can cause early childhood blindness.