Can completely cure deafness in 5 - 10 years

In the near future, using gene therapy, human deafness will be completely cured.

Using gene therapy can cure deafness in the next 5-10 years

Dr. Jeffrey Holt, a scientist at Kirby's Neurological and Biological Center at Children's Hospital Boston (USA) and associate professors in the field of ear-throat at the university. Harvard Medical has recently had a successful study of hearing restoration in mice with gene therapy.

Holt and colleagues' research has been published in the journal Science Translational Medicine and is hoping to soon be able to test a human body in the next 5-10 years.

Holt and his first author Charles Askew and colleagues at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (Switzerland) focused on the gene called TMC1 - one of 70 different gene types known as The cause of deafness in humans when they are mutated.

TMC1 accounts for 4-8% of genetic deafness and it plays a role in coding an important protein for hearing , enabling people to convert sound into brain-specific signals.

To bring this feature of the TMC1 gene into the ear, the team introduced it into a specially designed virus called adeno-associated virus 1 or AAV1 along with a catalyst that is a sequence of genes that can turn TMC1 gene into hair cells in the cochlea.

They then injected AAV1 into the ears of deaf mice with mutated TMC1. The result was quite satisfactory when the hair cells of the tested mice began to react to the sound and the electrical signals began to show up in the auditory part of the brain.

Close up of microvilli in human cochlea.

Holt's team had another important publication in 2013 about TMC1 and its association with TMC2 protein . Both of these proteins are very important for human hearing. Sensory hair cells have a protrusion called microvilli, each of these protruding heads has a signaling channel generated by the two proteins.

When sound waves are transmitted into the cochlea, it vibrates the microvilli and facilitates the opening of the transmission channel. Once the transmission channel opens, it will allow calcium elements to enter the cell and generate electrical signals that travel to the human brain.

Although radio channels lead signals generated by two proteins TMC1 and TMC2, however, only one of the two mutated genes can cause deafness. The Holt study also showed that gene therapy with TMC2 gene could be a suitable way to compensate for the loss of TMC1.

It is known that mutated cases of TMC1 often cause deafness in children from an early age, usually about 2 years after birth.

Although the research process is still long, this new study by scientists promises to open a new hopeful door for unfortunate patients with genetic- related deaf diseases. .