AMD Resource Center

Foundation-Funded AMD Research

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Why AMD research matters

Nearly 20 million Americans age 40 and older have AMD, and about 1.5 million have the advanced forms that threaten vision: geographic atrophy and wet AMD.1 AMD becomes far more common with age, affecting nearly half of people 85 and older.1

Behind every number is a person who wants to keep reading, driving and recognizing the faces of family, and often a son, daughter or partner helping them do it.

Treatments for wet AMD have transformed care, and the first treatments for geographic atrophy arrived in 2023. But for most people with early and intermediate dry AMD, options remain limited. Research is how that changes.

Key discoveries

  • 2005: Uncovering a genetic cause. A Foundation-funded research team was one of three groups to discover that a variant of the gene called CFH is linked to at least half of all AMD cases.2 The finding showed that an overactive part of the immune system drives AMD, a discovery that underlies today's approved GA treatments.
  • 2019: A dedicated AMD collaboration. The Foundation partnered with Dr. H. James and Carole Free to accelerate research to combat AMD.3
  • 2023: Investing in a CFH-targeting therapy. The Foundation's venture fund, now the Gund Vision Fund, invested in a $78 million Series B financing for Perceive Biotherapeutics to support therapies designed to protect against vision loss.4 Perceive's CFH gene therapy for dry AMD and GA is now in clinical trials.5
  • 2025: Foundation-funded technology reaches patients. Neurotech's encapsulated cell technology, previously funded by the Foundation for retinitis pigmentosa and dry AMD, received FDA approval for another retinal disease, macular telangiectasia type 2 (MacTel).6

Current AMD research grants

The Foundation has invested more than $23 million in 50 research awards with a focus on dry AMD, and 18 of those awards, totaling nearly $9.8 million, are active today.7 Foundation-funded scientists are working on three fronts: developing new treatments, understanding what causes drusen and dry AMD, and building better ways to measure vision so clinical trials can start earlier.

Developing new treatments

  • A new anti-inflammatory approach for GA. Sylvain Chemtob, Research Center of Hôpital Maisonneuve-Rosemont, Montreal. Advancing MU-010, a treatment designed to reduce harmful inflammation in geographic atrophy without suppressing the immune system. Brint Family Translational Research Award.
  • Harnessing the eye's own protective cells. Michael Hannan, Piximune, Inc. Developing antibodies that boost the ability of microglia, the eye's resident immune cells, to protect retinal tissue and slow GA, and preparing the therapy for clinical trials. Brint Family Translational Research Award.
  • One therapy for more than one disease. Aparna Lakkaraju, University of California, San Francisco. Testing a combination of two existing drugs that work together to protect retinal cells in both dry AMD and Stargardt disease. Brint Family Translational Research Award.
  • Faster drug discovery with patient stem cells. Daniel Paull, The Jackson Laboratory. Growing retinal cells from AMD patients' stem cells and using automation, imaging and AI to find new drug targets. Brint Family Translational Research Award.
  • A one-time gene regulation therapy. Lucie Guo, University of Pennsylvania. Developing a long-lasting, CRISPR-based treatment designed to reduce several drivers of GA at once after a single dose. Career Development Award

Understanding what causes dry AMD

  • Diet, the microbiome and drusen. Sheldon Rowan, Tufts University. Studying whether boosting a cellular cleanup process, through gene therapy or diet, can slow AMD, including testing an FDA-approved compound.
  • How drusen form. Glenn Yiu, UC Davis Health. Studying drusen in aging primates to find new drug targets and inform dietary recommendations.
  • How retinal support cells clear fat. Jason Miller, Kellogg Eye Center, University of Michigan. Investigating whether the retina's support cells can break down the fatty deposits that form drusen.
  • Why fats build up with age. Christopher Toomey, Shiley Eye Institute, UC San Diego. Exploring how age-related changes in the layer beneath the retina cause it to trap fats that lead to drusen.
  • The retina's energy crisis. Thomas Wubben, University of Michigan. Examining how changes in photoreceptor metabolism contribute to dry AMD.
  • Decoding a major AMD risk gene. Timothy Cherry, Seattle Children's Research Institute and University of Washington. Studying how genetic risk variants near the ARMS2 and HTRA1 genes drive atrophic AMD, and testing a gene-based rescue strategy.
  • A more realistic model of the aging eye. Jennifer Chao, University of Washington. Building a 3D, lab-grown model of the retina's support layers to speed up research and drug testing.

Measuring vision to enable earlier trials

  • Detecting decline sooner. Kristina Pfau, University Hospital Bonn. Developing sensitive dark-adaptation tests to catch early vision changes in GA, so treatments can be tested before significant vision is lost.
  • Seeing individual cells respond to light. Christopher Langlo, Medical College of Wisconsin. Using high-resolution imaging to measure how cone cells work near areas of atrophy and drusen.
  • A better eye chart for clinical trials. Artur Cideciyan, University of Pennsylvania. Creating a new vision test for clinical use in intermediate dry AMD and inherited retinal diseases.

Research priorities ahead

In the years ahead, the Foundation will focus its AMD investments to advance the understanding and treatment of early dry AMD by identifying the mechanisms that drive the transition from normal aging to disease, developing disease-relevant models, and and clinical endpoints and translating those insights into interventions that can prevent or slow progression to advanced AMD.

Continuing the clinical pipeline

Through the Gund Vision Fund, the Foundation invests directly in companies developing promising therapies for blinding diseases, including AMD. Returns are reinvested in the mission. More than 20 potential therapies for dry AMD and geographic atrophy are now in clinical trials, many made possible by Foundation support.