Establishing a Swine Model to Study Whole Eye Transplant Dynamic Preservation and Transplantation

Area of Science:

• Ophthalmology
• Transplantation Biology
• Regenerative Medicine

Background:

• Whole Eye Transplant (WET) offers potential for vision restoration after severe eye injury.
• Current ex vivo preservation methods, like static cold storage (SCS), are inadequate for WET due to rapid neural tissue degeneration.
• Effective ex vivo graft preservation is critical for successful WET outcomes.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate subnormothermic machine perfusion (SNMP) as an improved ex vivo preservation method for Whole Eye Transplant (WET).
• To adapt and apply SNMP techniques to a swine WET model.
• To establish a detailed protocol for SNMP preservation of the eye for transplantation.

Main Methods:

• Application of subnormothermic machine perfusion (SNMP) to a swine eye model.
• Detailed description of the anatomical setup and preservation protocol for WET.
• Leveraging prior experience in translating SNMP for vascularized composite allotransplantation (VCA).

Main Results:

• Successful application of SNMP for ex vivo preservation of a swine WET.
• Demonstration of SNMP's potential to overcome limitations of static cold storage for eye grafts.
• Establishment of a viable protocol for optimizing WET preservation.

Conclusions:

• Subnormothermic machine perfusion (SNMP) is a promising technique for ex vivo Whole Eye Transplant (WET) preservation.
• SNMP offers advantages over static cold storage for maintaining graft viability.
• This study represents a significant advancement in WET preservation and transplantation strategies.