Current research of retinal ischemia model in rodent

Retinal ischemia is a common cause of blindness and visual impairment.Some eye diseases,such as glaucoma,retinal artery occlusion and diabetic retinopathy,are associated with retinal ischemia.It is very important to build an ideal animal model which can imitate human retinal ischemia disease for investigating the pathological mechanism and treatment of retinal ischemia.Rodent is a popular choice for retinal ischemia model due to its availability and the similarity to human retinal blood supply.To provide a supportive evidence of retinal ischemia research,some literature concerning rodent models is reviewed and various methods to build the model are summarized,such as elevated intraocular pressure,optic nerve ligation,ligation of vessels,photo-chemistry,endothelin-1 injection and middle cerebral artery occlusion intraluminal suture,etc.Here,the specific protocols,the pathological changes and molecular mechanism of each model are reviewed. Key words: Retinal ischemia;  Rodents;  Animal model