Now, silk being used to grow corneal tissue

Yes, the silk from silkworms can be utilised to culture corneal endothelial cells artificially and then transplant them in corneal transplant patients

Hyderabad: Naturally produced silk is widely used to design luxurious sarees and other outfits. But now, a group of researchers from Hyderabad is using this fabric, which is biocompatible, to grow corneal tissue for corneal transplants in human beings.

Yes, the silk from silkworms can be utilised to culture corneal endothelial cells artificially and then transplant them in corneal transplant patients.

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Led by a group of researchers from Hyderabad-based LV Prasad Eye Institute (LVPEI), the study results, which were recently published in the ACS Biomaterials Science Engineering (American Chemical Society), point to the ‘suitability of silk film for safely engineering a corneal endothelial layer in the lab’.

The study used silk protein from two non-mulberry silkworms Philosamia ricini (PR), which is used to produce Ahimsa silk; and Antheraea assamensis, which produces Assam’s famous Tussar silk.

The cornea is the transparent tissue that reflects light into the eye and is made up of different layers. The thickest layer of the cornea is the stroma and a layer of cells, which hydrates it, is called endothelium. In corneal transplants, a damaged endothelium is replaced. However, due to the perennial shortage of corneal tissue, researchers are engineering corneal endothelial layers in laboratories, the researchers said.

To engineer endothelial layers, LVPEI researchers are employing films of silk as a substrate or scaffolding on which the corneal cell layers can be grown. The research team, including Swatilekha Hazra and Dr Charanya Ramachandran from LVPEI and Souradeep Ray and Dr Biman Mandal from IIT Guwahati, have examined the long-term viability of silk film as a scaffold to culture corneal endothelial cells and have indicated that it is safe to do so.

“Though this is an oft-overlooked aspect in tissue engineering, it is important to ensure that the material used to culture the cells does not negatively impact their growth, phenotype or function. This study gives us further confidence that the silk films are indeed suitable for engineering the corneal endothelium for transplantation,” Dr Ramachandran, scientist at the Prof Brien Holden Eye Research Centre, LVPEI, says in the study.