New Insight into exudative Age-related Macular Degeneration (AMD): A Metabolomics Approach

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is common disease and leading causes of vision loss among people aged 50 and older. Late-stage AMD (called exudative) is characterized by choroidal neovascularization (CNV) and results in complete loss of central vision acuity leading to severe visual impairment and legal blindness. Currently, AMD diagnosis relies on ophthalmologic exams and treatments of the exudative form using anti-angiogenic drugs targeting vascular endothelial growth factors (VEGF). Despite these advances, the identification of therapeutic treatments and related biomarkers are essentials.
In this study, we applied a NMR-based metabolomics approach on a cohort of AMD patients and on a laser-induced murine CNV experimental model that mimics the pathology angiogenesis’s development phase. Sera from controls and AMD patients (in active and non-active pathology’s phases) and from induced and non-induced mice have been collected and submitted to a metabolomics study, using a multivariate approach.
This approach allows differentiation between active and non-active AMD patients and between laser-induced and the control mice groups. Moreover, the discriminating spectral zones are the same in both human and mice’s models, leading to the emergence of putative biomarkers of the exudative AMD. Among those, lactate and lipoprotein emerges as a key metabolite in both settings.
Here we suggest metabolomics as a novel option for patients’ follow-up and new therapeutical strategies targeting lactate metabolism for AMD.