Article Image

IPFS News Link • Science, Medicine and Technology

Cell-laden contact lens being developed to treat eye injuries

• https://newatlas.com, Ben Coxworth

While this does help repair the eye, an Australian scientist is developing what he believes may be a better alternative – a wound-healing contact lens.

Amniotic membranes have proven anti-inflammatory and anti-scarring effects, plus they contain growth factors that promote wound healing. According to the Queensland University of Technology's Prof. Damien Harkin, however, those qualities vary significantly between individual samples. Additionally, the donated membranes are often in short supply.

That's where his contact lens comes in.

More precisely, it's a scleral lens, which is a large therapeutic contact lens that forms a tear-filled vault over the cornea. Its inside surface is coated with limbal mesenchymal stromal cells, which could be harvested from readily-available donor eye tissue that is ordinarily discarded after corneal transplants. These cells, he claims, have more consistent wound-healing qualities than the amniotic membranes, and should be easier to obtain.


ContentSafe