据《自然—生物技术》上一项研究报告显示，在皮氏培养皿中培养小鼠胚胎干细胞所产生的感光细胞能与患有视网膜疾病的成年小鼠的视网膜相融合。这意味着，通过细胞疗法来矫正因视网膜疾病或损伤造成的失明的研究又迈进了一步。

在与年龄相关的黄斑退化和各种遗传视网膜疾病中，视网膜的功能会因为一种被称为“感光体”的感光细胞受损而丧失。先前研究发现，对于患有类似疾病的失明小鼠来说，可以通过从视力正常的年轻小鼠的视网膜中分离出未成熟的感光体并移植到失明小鼠视网膜中，从而改善其视力。

Robin Ali等人从胚胎干细胞中获取并培养出未成熟的类似视杆细胞并进行了研究。他们发现，利用一种最近公开的3D方法制得的未成熟感光体能够与患有多种视网膜疾病的接受移植的小鼠的视网膜相融合。而且，在成活小鼠体内，植入的细胞会发育成熟，其功能与发育完全的视杆细胞很相似。

不过，研究人员并未检查小鼠的视力是否能够得以改善，因为那样的话，所需的可移植细胞数量可能要比此项研究所用到的多出很多。

英文摘要：

Nature Biotechnology doi:10.1038/nbt.2643

Photoreceptor precursors derived from three-dimensional embryonic stem cell cultures integrate and mature within adult degenerate retina

Anai Gonzalez-Cordero， Emma L West， Rachael A Pearson， Yanai Duran， Livia S Carvalho， Colin J Chu， Arifa Naeem， Samuel J I Blackford， Anastasios Georgiadis， Jorn Lakowski， Mike Hubank， Alexander J Smith， James W B Bainbridge， Jane C Sowden & Robin R Ali

Irreversible blindness caused by loss of photoreceptors may be amenable to cell therapy. We previously demonstrated retinal repair1 and restoration of vision through transplantation of photoreceptor precursors obtained from postnatal retinas into visually impaired adult mice2， 3. Considerable progress has been made in differentiating embryonic stem cells (ESCs) in vitro toward photoreceptor lineages4， 5， 6. However， the capability of ESC-derived photoreceptors to integrate after transplantation has not been demonstrated unequivocally. Here， to isolate photoreceptor precursors fit for transplantation， we adapted a recently reported three-dimensional (3D) differentiation protocol that generates neuroretina from mouse ESCs6. We show that rod precursors derived by this protocol and selected via a GFP reporter under the control of a Rhodopsin promoter integrate within degenerate retinas of adult mice and mature into outer segment–bearing photoreceptors. Notably， ESC-derived precursors at a developmental stage similar to postnatal days 4–8 integrate more efficiently compared with cells at other stages. This study shows conclusively that ESCs can provide a source of photoreceptors for retinal cell transplantation.