In this respect, we recently reported that diabetic patients carrying the rs139876191 HMGA1 variant (which causes reduced HMGA1 protein expression) had a significantly lower risk of proliferative diabetic retinopathy, compared to non-carrier patients, and this protective effect was attributed, at least in part, to downregulation of the vascular endothelial growth factor A, a major activator of neovascularization [48]. Here, HMGA1 is linked to proliferative diabetic retinopathy.