Researchers Regrow Human Corneas: First Known Tissue Grown from a Human Stem Cell

A restored functional cornea following transplantation of human ABCB5-positive limbal stem cells to limbal stem cell-deficient mice. Transplants consisting of human ABCB5-positive limbal stem cells resulted in restoration and long-term maintenance of a normal clear cornea, whereas control mice that received either no cells or ABCB5-negative cells failed to restore the cornea. Image credit: Kira Lathrop, Bruce Ksander, Markus Frank, Natasha Frank and Paraskevi Kolovou.

Limbal stem cells — identified with a new marker — could reverse a leading cause of blindness

Boston researchers have identified a way to enhance regrowth of human corneal tissue to restore vision, using a molecule known as ABCB5 that acts as a marker for hard-to-find limbal stem cells. This work, a collaboration between the Massachusetts Eye and Ear/Schepens Eye Research Institute (Mass. Eye and Ear), Boston Children’s Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the VA Boston Healthcare System, provides promise to burn victims, victims of chemical injury and others with damaging eye diseases. The research, published this week in Nature, is also one of the first known examples of constructing a tissue from an adult-derived human stem cell.

Limbal stem cells reside in the eye’s basal limbal epithelium, or limbus, and help maintain and regenerate corneal tissue. Their loss due to injury or disease is one of the leading causes of blindness. In the past, tissue or cell transplants have been used to help the cornea regenerate, but it was unknown whether there were actual limbal stem cells in the grafts, or how many, and the outcomes were not consistent.

In this study, researchers were able to use antibodies detecting ABCB5 to zero in on the stem cells in tissue from deceased human donors and use them to regrow anatomically correct, fully functional human corneas in mice.

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