Nearsightedness and farsightedness could be linked to altered thyroid activity, Purdue University research suggests.

Zeran Li, an undergraduate student in biological sciences, recently won a Grant-in-Aid award from Sigma Xi, an international honor society of research scientists and engineers to support her research.

“I aim to find out how thyroid hormone activity is regulating eye growth and define (the) specific molecular mechanism by which this activity controls eye growth,”

Li said in an e-mail.

“This knowledge will potentially help us to design specific drugs to control the eye growth process and provide a non-invasive treatment for nearsightedness and farsightedness.”

Li will use the $2,500 award, which includes funding from the National Academy of Sciences, to test whether the lower thyroid activity actually causes a smaller eye size.

Farsightedness and nearsightedness or refractive errors are common conditions. About 11 million Americans 12 years and older suffer from some form of refractive error, which includes nearsightedness and farsightedness, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Nearsightedness or myopia occurs when the eye is too long causing the visual image to focus in front of the retina. Farsightedness or hyperopia occurs when the eye is too small, causing the visual image to focus behind the retina, according to the National Institutes of Health.

When the images are not focused directly on the retina, this creates blurred vision.

In her research, Li found that zebrafish embryos treated with the chemical phenylthiourea (PTU), which blocks pigment in the fish for research purposes, have smaller eyes than the untreated fish. After investigating the chemical, Li found that in addition to making the fish transparent, the chemical also lowers thyroid activity.

Yuk Fai Leung, an assistant professor of biological sciences who studies gene regulation of eye development and degenerative diseases, said Li’s research opens doors for possible new treatments.

“Any possible lead that can help us understand the regulation of the eye size may potentially open up a new avenue to understand the mechanism that controls the growth,”

Leung said.

“If we can understand that mechanism, then … we can contemplate the potential design of a pharmaceutical drug.”