2 | Inquiry
ABOVE: Fruit fly larvae
While stunting the larvae’s movement seems contradictory to the lab’s ultimate goal of improve motor function in PD patients, Dr. Lee explained that this is the important first step to proving the technique is working. “It is a really important addition to this lab,” Dr. Lee said. “We are not only seeing changes at the gene level and cell level, but [now] at the behavioral level, too.” While clinical uses of optogenetics for sustaining motor function in PD patients are a long way off, the progress with this new technique has gone better than expected. In humans, this treatment will be potentially tricky because gene therapy is difficult, Varga said. However, the implantation of an electrode –
the needed source of light – within someone’s brain is already on the horizons, he added. “It is already a surgical technique that exists; we would just be replacing electricity with light,” Varga said. The treatment would use a similar mechanism as a pacemaker, except using light to release dopamine for motor function. In the present, Varga hopes that someone will continue this project as he moves on to medical school. However, the feeling of accomplishment from Varga’s first dabbling in optogenetics is not something he, or Dr. Lee, will leave behind. “That was one of the most excited moments that I had witnessed in my science career,” Dr. Lee said.