Epithelial membrane protein-2 promotes VEGF signaling to promote pathological neovascular growth in retinopathy of prematurity

Retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) is a leading cause of childhood blindness, and exclusively affects infants born prematurely. In this study, we test the hypothesis that EMP2 contributes to neovascularization in a mouse model of the disease. We show that EMP2 promotes neuronal VEGF signaling and that its downregulation reduces severity of neovascularization. RNA-Seq was performed on RNA from frozen retinal tissues. Four replicates from the following conditions were profild: WT normoxia, EMP2 KO normoxia, WT hyperoxia, and EMP2 KO hyperoxia group at P17.