Magnesium acethyltaurate as a potential agent for retinal and optic nerve protection in glaucoma

摘要

Glaucoma is the second leading cause of irreversible vision impairment affecting more than 70 million people worldwide with approximately 10% suffering from glaucoma-related bilateral blind (Quigley and Broman, 2006). It is a multi-factorial disease that is characterized by optic nerve damage and visual field loss. Progressive loss of retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) resulting in visual field deficits is the hallmark of glaucoma. Sever-al etiological factors seem to be involved in its pathophysiology, however the precise mechanisms leading to its development remain unclear. Some of the widely described factors that contribute to RGC loss include axonal transport failure, neurotrophic factor depletion, excitotoxicity, mitochon-drial dysfunction, activation of intrinsic and extrinsic apoptotic cascade and oxidative stress (Agarwal et al., 2009). The basic mechanisms that contribute to RGC degeneration in glaucoma are presented in Figure 1. Current treatment strategies for glaucoma are limited to the reduction of intraocular pressure (IOP); however, it is clear now that the disease pro-gression may continue despite effective IOP lowering. Search for newer modalities has led to emergence of significant data from experimental re-search suggesting potentially new neuroprotective strategies that may add to the arsenal of existing antiglaucoma agents (Vasudevan et al., 2011).