The limbal epithelial cells can be maintained on 3T3 feeder layer with fetal bovine serum supplemented culture medium, and these cells have been used to successfully treat limbal stem cell deficiency. However, fetal bovine serum contains unknown components and displays quantitative and qualitative lot-to-lot variations. To improve the culture condition, the defined KnockOut serum replacement wa...

Nerve growth factor (NGF), a member of the neurotrophin family, has been identified as an essential growth factor supporting stem cell self-renewal outside the nervous system and was previously shown to stimulate corneal epithelial proliferation both in vivo and in vitro. In this study, we evaluated the expression of NGF and its corresponding receptors in the human corneal and limbal tissues, a...

The human cornea requires a smooth, transparent, robust and renewable surface to maintain its key optical and protective functions. The corneal epithelium is maintained by a local population of “stem cells”, which although not truly pluripotent, are capable of self-regeneration by asymmetric division. These cells are located at the limbus the region where the conjunctiva-covered sclera meets th...

The human cornea requires a smooth, transparent, robust and renewable surface to maintain its key optical and protective functions. The corneal epithelium is maintained by a local population of “stem cells”, which although not truly pluripotent, are capable of self-regeneration by asymmetric division. These cells are located at the limbus the region where the conjunctiva-covered sclera meets th...

we are describing a new surgical approach in the management of advanced ocular surface cicatrization through a single procedure conjunctival-limbal-corneal allograft in which the external eye is resurfaced it involves a lamellar corneolimbal keratoplasty, 360° limbal stem cell transfer (on a “bipedicle” conjunctival-corneal carrier), and conjunctival tissue transplantation - all in a single con...

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES The ocular surface is an ideal region to study the epithelial stem cell (SC) biology because of the unique spatial arrangement of stem cells and transient amplifying cells. A major challenge in corneal SC biology is the ability to identify SC in vitro and in situ, and one of the major controversies in the field relates to reliable SC markers. This study was carried out t...

Corneal epithelium is a self-renewing tissue. Recent studies indicate that corneal epithelial stem cells reside preferentially in the basal layer of peripheral cornea in the limbal zone, rather than uniformly in the entire corneal epithelium. This idea is supported by a unique limbal/corneal expression pattern of the K3 keratin marker for corneal-type differentiation; the preferential distribut...

The ocular surface consists of two distinct types of epithelial cells; conjunctival and corneal. Although anatomically continuous, these epithelia comprise two distinct cell populations. Corneal stem cells are located at the limbus. The microenvironment of the limbus is important in maintaining "stemness" of the stem cells and also acts as a barrier to conjunctival epithelial cells preventing t...

Limbal epithelial stem cells may ameliorate limbal stem cell deficiency through secretion of therapeutic proteins, delivered to the cornea in a controlled manner using hydrogels. In the present study the secretome of alginate-encapsulated limbal epithelial stem cells is investigated. Conditioned medium was generated from limbal epithelial stem cells encapsulated in 1.2% (w/v) calcium alginate g...

The effects of sclerocorneal limbal stem cell autograft transplantation in dogs with corneal wounds were studied. Eighteen dogs were divided in two groups (GI and GII). The animals of GI (n=12) underwent limbal transplantation 30 days after the destruction of limbal stem cells. The dogs of GII (n=6) only underwent destruction of stem cells (control group). Light microscopy examination of the ri...