Timothy Kraft, PhD, is an expert in retinal physiology who has studied the function and biophysics of retinal photoreceptors for almost 30 years. Kraft has worked with fellow UAB researcher Dr. Erik Roberson, and together they have proven a functional loss in the retinas of an animal model of frontotemporal dementia, which parallels similar problems in human patients.

This vision loss is attributable to a loss of ganglion cells in the retina whose functional deficits Kraft was able to measure in an animal model of dementia. What are the next exciting step? Several possibilities include further refining the vision testing and applying those tests to human patients. Another opportunity is testing retinal function in other models of Alzheimer’s and dementia to further investigate the visual ramifications of brain diseases.