Related Experiment Video
Updated: Mar 20, 2026
A Surgical Approach for Optic Nerve Crush in a Rabbit Model
Published on: July 8, 2025
Human umbilical cord blood-derived stem cells and brain-derived neurotrophic factor protect injured optic nerve:
Xue-Man Lv1, Yan Liu2, Fei Wu3
1Department of Ophthalmology, China-Japan Union Hospital of Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin Province, China.
Abstract:
The optic nerve is a viscoelastic solid-like biomaterial. Its normal stress relaxation and creep properties enable the nerve to resist constant strain and protect it from injury. We hypothesized that stress relaxation and creep properties of the optic nerve change after injury. More-over, human brain-derived neurotrophic factor or umbilical cord blood-derived stem cells may restore these changes to normal. To validate this hypothesis, a rabbit model of optic nerve injury was established using a clamp approach. At 7 days after injury, the vitreous body re-ceived a one-time injection of 50 μg human brain-derived neurotrophic factor or 1 × 10(6) human umbilical cord blood-derived stem cells. At 30 days after injury, stress relaxation and creep properties of the optic nerve that received treatment had recovered greatly, with patho-logical changes in the injured optic nerve also noticeably improved. These results suggest that human brain-derived neurotrophic factor or umbilical cord blood-derived stem cell intervention promotes viscoelasticity recovery of injured optic nerves, and thereby contributes to nerve recovery.
