Cornea preservation in culture with bovine serum or chicken ovalbumin

To explore the possibility of replacing bovine serum with chicken ovalbumin in cornea preservation.

Twenty-one pairs of corneas were cultivated at 31 degrees C in a medium containing either 2% (vol/vol) of newborn calf serum (one cornea) or 2 mg/mL of chicken ovalbumin (the contralateral cornea). The evaluation of corneal endothelium was performed after 7 days (one pair) and between 11 and 37 days (20 pairs). Evaluation included the number and the morphology of endothelial cells, their viability, and the pattern of swelling of the intercellular borders.

A preliminary test showed that the incubation of a cornea for 7 days with ovalbumin did not cause acute toxic effects. Subsequent experiments showed that this protein was as efficient as bovine serum in preserving the viability and the density of endothelial cells for long periods of incubation. After a mean of 21 +/- 10 days of culture, the number of endothelial cells was 2,455 +/- 230/mm2 in the serum group and 2,430 +/- 181/mm2 in the ovalbumin group. During the longest incubation period, irregular swelling of cell borders and other signs of endothelial degeneration were occasionally observed.

Replacing serum with chicken ovalbumin resulted in the efficient preservation of corneal endothelium for at least 3 weeks of culture. These data suggest that ovalbumin may be an effective basic component in the design of a serum-free culture medium.