| Summary: | Retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) dysfunction and degeneration underlie the development of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), which is the leading cause of blindness worldwide. In this study, we investigated whether cerium oxide nanoparticles (CeO<sub>2</sub>-NPs or nanoceria), which are anti-oxidant agents with auto-regenerative properties, are able to preserve the RPE. On ARPE-19 cells, we found that CeO<sub>2</sub>-NPs promoted cell viability against H<sub>2</sub>O<sub>2</sub>–induced cellular damage. For the in vivo studies, we used a rat model of acute light damage (LD), which mimics many features of AMD. CeO<sub>2</sub>-NPs intravitreally injected three days before LD prevented RPE cell death and degeneration and nanoceria labelled with fluorescein were found localized in the cytoplasm of RPE cells. CeO<sub>2</sub>-NPs inhibited epithelial-mesenchymal transition of RPE cells and modulated autophagy by the down-regulation of LC3B-II and p62. Moreover, the treatment inhibited nuclear localization of LC3B. Taken together, our study demonstrates that CeO<sub>2</sub>-NPs represent an eligible candidate to counteract RPE degeneration and, therefore, a powerful therapy for AMD.
|
|---|
