Plasticity of retinal microglia

Microglia are resident cells that play an important active role in maintaining healthy tissue. On the other hand, in a number of disease conditions they also contribute to the resulting pathology.  Delineation of how they switch between these roles is fundamental to understanding disease. Discovering how the specific pathways that regulate retinal microglia and determine how these are altered during acute and chronic inflammation in Uveitis and AMD, will permit identification of targets that could be used therapeutically to restore homeostasis.