a native-like corneal construct using donor corneal stroma for tissue engineering类原生角膜构造使用捐赠者为组织工程角膜基质.pdfVIP

A Native-Like Corneal Construct Using Donor Corneal Stroma for Tissue Engineering 1,2 1,3 1,2 1 1 1 1 Jing Lin , Kyung-Chul Yoon , Lili Zhang , Zhitao Su , Rong Lu , Ping Ma , Cintia S. De Paiva , 1 1 Stephen C. Pflugfelder , De-Quan Li * 1 Ocular Surface Center, Cullen Eye Institute, Department of Ophthalmology, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, United States of America, 2 Department of Ophthalmology, the Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University Medical College, Qingdao, China, 3 Department of Ophthalmology, Chonnam National University Medical School and Hospital, Gwangju, South Korea Abstract Tissue engineering holds great promise for corneal transplantation to treat blinding diseases. This study was to explore the use of natural corneal stroma as an optimal substrate to construct a native like corneal equivalent. Human corneal epithelium was cultivated from donor limbal explants on corneal stromal discs prepared by FDA approved Horizon Epikeratome system. The morphology, phenotype, regenerative capacity and transplantation potential were evaluated by hematoxylin eosin and immunofluorescent staining, a wound healing model, and the xeno-transplantation of the corneal constructs to nude mice. An optically transparent and stratified epithelium was rapidly generated on donor corneal stromal substrate and displayed native-like morphology and structure. The cells were polygonal in the basal layer and became flattened in superficial layers. The epithelium displayed a phenotype similar to human corneal epithelium in vivo. The differentiation markers, keratin 3, invol