Studies on retinal and retinal pigment epithelial gene expression.

The 'completion' of the murine and human genomes and creation of high-density expressed sequence tag (EST) databases from multiple tissues and multiple species, coupled with the development of high-throughput expression profiling approaches such as microarrays and Serial Analysis of Gene Expression (SAGE), is making possible the in-depth analysis of gene expression patterns in health and disease to an extent that was not previously possible. Such new information is providing insight into normal function, and into how normal function is altered in disease. Efforts have begun, and are accelerating, in the application of expression profiling to the study of the retina and retinal pigment epithelium (RPE). In this chapter we will review progress in this area. We will also discuss technical issues that make expression studies of the RPE particularly challenging, and share our experience in methodological approaches to overcome these challenges.