While therapies are only emerging?

What does "While therapies are only emerging" mean? Does it mean "Now, therapies begin to appear?"

Context:

ScienceDaily (June 8, 2011) — Scientists have just reported that the tiny light-sensing cells known as rods have been clearly and directly imaged in the living eye for the first time. Using adaptive optics (AO), the same technology astronomers use to study distant stars and galaxies, scientists can see through the murky distortion of the outer eye, revealing the eye's cellular structure with unprecedented detail. This innovation, described in two papers in the Optical Society's (OSA) open access journal Biomedical Optics Express, will help doctors diagnose degenerative eye disorders sooner, leading to quicker intervention and more effective treatments.

"While therapies are only emerging, the ability to see the cells you are trying to rescue represents a critical first step in the process of restoring sight," says researcher Alfredo Dubra of the University of Rochester in New York, who led the team of researchers from Rochester, Marquette University, and the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW), Milwaukee. "It's impossible to overemphasize how important early detection is to eye disease."

"One of the major hurdles in detecting retinal disease is that by the time it can be perceived by the patient or detected with clinical tools, significant cellular damage has often already occurred," adds team member Joseph Carroll of MCW.