Genetic Research on High Myopic Individuals in Northern China

As a serious pattern of myopia, high myopia (HM) generally refers to a condition where the spherical equivalent (SE) refraction exceeds -6.00 diopters (D) or the axial length (AL) is longer than 26.00 mm. Abundant studies have indicated the strong correlation of HM with multiple vision-threatening ophthalmic diseases, including rhegmatogenous retinal detachment, retinoschisis, retinochoroid atrophy and open-angle glaucoma. It is reported that the worldwide prevalence of HM has surpassed over 2.9% in recent years. And a study on subjects living in Minnesota from the 1960s to the 2010s demonstrates that the data has progressively increasing from 2.8% to 8.3%, which is not related with gender or race, although no evident significance has yet been proved in some groups. What's worse, it is speculated that HM patients are expected to account for 9.8% of the global population by 2050, which will gravely hinder the progress of social development. As a result, it is of profound implications to explore the pathogenesis of HM and the prospective therapeutic or remedial strategies.

What has been universally acknowledged is that both environmental and genetic factors matter much in the onset and exacerbation of myopia, with the latter particularly predominating in the etiology of HM. Accordingly, discussing the causation of HM from heredity version is likely to be the most promising research field, which is just the researchers' interest at the present.

Inclusion criteria

• HM participants are characterized by AL ≥ 26.00 mm or SE ≤ -6.00 D in at least one eye.

Exclusion criteria

• Individuals with other ocular or systemic connective tissue diseases were excluded.