Can Gene Therapy Change Eye Color?

[dreamingofouterspace]

Gene Therapy

Can you use gene therapy to change eye color (or something other than that to permanently change eye color) or is gene therapy not available for that yet?

 

[chroot]

Such practices are certainly not available yet. Gene therapy is a nascent field.

Is such a thing possible even in principle? I don't know. It depends on how quickly the pigment in the iris decays and has to be replenished by the cells.

- Warren

 

[Monique]

Theoretically anything is possible. The problem is targetting the gene to the right cells and having enough cells actually take up and incorporate the gene so that it will be functional. You have to study the physiology of the eye to make an assessment whether it is possible to perform gene therapy. Should the therapy be delivered by blood, or by eye droplets? Another problem is that brown eye color is a dominant trade, so you have to inactivate the working gene before you can have blue or green eyes.

At the moment gene therapy is used for treating severe diseases that cannot be treated with conventional medicine: diseases where copies of genes are malfunctioning such as in the case of SCID or cystic fibrosis. There are some issues with the safety of gene therapy.

 

[dreamingofouterspace]

I heard that there were eyedrops that could be used to permanently change the color of your eye...I heard that they did this by stopping the production of the melanocytes and reducing the amoung of them

 

[Monique]

There are certain medications used as eye drops that as a side effect can have increased pigmentation of the melanocytes. I'm not sure why you would want reduced pigmentation.

 

[dreamingofouterspace]

Well I thought it would be neat to change my eye color and apparently I could with this (the eyedrops)

 

[Monique]

It's a side effect of the medication so you can't. You've got lenses to change eye color.

 

[dreamingofouterspace]

I know but these eyedrops are supposed to actually change your eye color. permanently (Well I mean, I guess the eye color could still change according to the weather or persons mood or something because I guess occasionally eye color does change) But these eyedrops arent supposed to change eye color as a side effect...their purpose is supposed to be to change eye color (Progressively, over a period of time) (by stopping the production of the melanocytes and reducing the amoung of them)

 

[Monique]

So which eyedrops are those?

 

[dreamingofouterspace]

I haven't used them or anything but apparently the eyedrops consist of "all raw materials (which are herbal)l and a saline solution base"
Apparently "It has been a solo side project for years with imput from various chemists, however, I (the person selling it), myself developed the product, it has taken much trial and error to achieve this, over 4 years, but it is safe and effective, just progressive, so you have to be patient."

You can get them here
http://www.eyelighteningcom.easystorecreator.net/

 

[Monique]

Right, the website is not even working. There are many products on the market claiming that they do something, don't trust that. The drops could even have harmful side-effects if they were not studied properly.

And the function of the melanin is to prevent light from passing through the iris and to absorb any internally reflected light inside the eye, why take away the function.

 

[Monique]

Observations suggest that light iris pigmentation is associated with more extensive retinal disease in patients with unilateral neovascular AMD. http://www.iovs.org/cgi/content/abstract/35/6/2734

 

[matthyaouw]

I was able to view the website briefly, although it stopped working before I could view their 'testemonials'.
It made vague claims about how they can lighten your iris, but said little about how. I'd personally rather not risk it without the opinion of a medical professional (actually, I'd rather not do it at all, but if I was determined, I'd deffinately want proof that there were no side effects first)

 

[dreamingofouterspace]

She said she was an R & D Chemist for four years and stuff, maybe there's some way to check that...I guess I could check stuff like that

 

[alpha5a]

Could you please post or email me the contact info of this person. I am very interested in tracking this stuff down. It's very hard to find info on it on the internet. I've seen lots of talk about it being herbal and very natural with no side effects and different chemists who were developing it. Anyhoo, any and all info you have would be very much appreciated.