Animal Models of Experimental Myopia: Limitations and Synergies with Studies on Human Myopia

This article reviews the basic methods used in experimental myopia, from the perspective of how they can be used to provide insights into human myopia. Experimental myopia in non-human primates provides the best model for human myopia, but there is an important limitation in that all studies on experimental myopia are performed at an early developmental period, which corresponds to the early neonatal period of refractive development in humans, where the greatest plasticity is observed. Another important limitation is that the means used to induce experimental myopia are not clearly related to those which lead to human myopia. Other experimental animals deviate more markedly from the developmental patterns seen in humans and suffer from the same limitations, but all can be used to explore molecular and cellular mechanisms at a level of detail which cannot be achieved in humans. The article then considers several case studies of synergism between studies on human and experimental myopia and finally proposes a model pathway as a basis for further studies on both human and experimental myopia.