Figure 5
From: A decellularized human corneal scaffold for anterior corneal surface reconstruction
Ex Vivo transplantation of decellularized human cornea (DHC) (A) micrograph of DHC transplanted ex vivo in the normal human cornea (NHC) as anterior lamellar grafts with double running cross-stitch sutures. (B) AS-OCT micrograph showing the well-adapted graft (DHC) and host tissue (NHC) and no gap was observed in between. (C) After 2 weeks (2 w) of transplantation, histological analyses by hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) staining showed complete epithelialization of graft tissue with stratification and absence of stromal cells in graft tissue (2 w) (dashed line marking the boundary between the graft and host tissue). The stromal cells appeared in the graft region at 5 weeks samples confirmed by H&E staining (5 w). Scale bar—100 µm D) Immunohistochemical staining on paraffin sections showing the cytokeratin (pan-CK) expression on epithelial layers; CK3 expression on suprabasal cells; CK15, P(placental)-cadherin, p63 (dotted line separated the basal and superficial cells), and Ki-67 expression at basal layers of epithelial cells (arrowheads); E(epithelial)-cadherin expression in all epithelial layers; vimentin expression in the stromal region (arrowheads); and Melan-A expression (magenta) (arrowheads) on melanocytes at basal layers of epithelium, in both host and graft tissue. A keratocan expression was observed only in the graft tissue (arrowheads). AS-OCT anterior segment optical coherence tomography, pan-CK pan-cytokeratin, CK3 cytokeratin 3, CK15 cytokeratin 15.
