Diurnal Retinal and Choroidal Gene Expression Patterns Distinguish Myopia Progression from Myopia Onset

Following laboratory and clinical findings implicating circadian biology in the pathogenesis of myopia (nearsightedness), we examined gene expression in two crucial tissues controlling post-natal refractive development, the retina and choroid. Inducing unilateral visual form deprivation myopia in young chicks, a widely studied and validated model, we isolated retinal and choroidal tissues every 4 hours over a single day from myopic and contralateral control eyes during a period time when myopia progresses rapidly. After applying RNA-Seq to each tissue extract, we used various bioinformatics and gene expression profiling analyses to assess the retinas and choroids at each time point. We extended these findings with Gene Set Enrichment Analysis and with comparison to candidate genes for human myopia.