[Experience of culturing anterior epithelial corneal cells from human eye ball]

Adult corneal epithelium is often exposed to environmental stress, injured and repaired by limbal stem cells. Injury of corneal epithelial layer leads to reduction of visual clarity and loss of vision. Recently it was shown that epithelial layer also contains stem cells. Obtaining cell culture of corneal epithelium will allow understanding mechanisms of cell behavior and differentiation, their metabolism and reaction on environmental stress in health and disease. Moreover, cultured corneal epithelial cells can be considered as a promising material for constructing bioartificial cornea. The aim of this study was to isolate cells of anterior corneal epithelium from human donor cornea and to study their morphological and functional characteristics in vitro. The results of our study showed the possibility of culturing epithelial cells in vitro. The observed changes in cell morphology, their flow growth character as well as active proliferation and up-regulation of mesenchymal markers expression, indicate, in our opinion, epithelial-mesenchymal transition taking place in long-lasting culture of human anterior corneal epithelial cells. The obtained cultures can be used for further studies of pathological processes taking place in cells during drugs testing or controlling the phototoxic effect of different types of emission.