Tissue Engineering the Cornea: The Evolution of RAFT

Journal of Functional Biomaterials

Hannah J. Levis¹  Alvena K. Kureshi²  Isobel Massie²  Louise Morgan²  Amanda J. Vernon²  Julie T. Daniels² 

[1] Department of Ocular Biology and Therapeutics, UCL Institute of Ophthalmology, 11-43 Bath Street, London, EC1V 9EL, UK;

关键词: cornea;    epithelium;    endothelium;    tissue engineering;    repair;    RAFT;    collagen;    GMP;   

DOI  :  10.3390/jfb6010050

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

Corneal blindness affects over 10 million people worldwide and current treatment strategies often involve replacement of the defective layer with healthy tissue. Due to a worldwide donor cornea shortage and the absence of suitable biological scaffolds, recent research has focused on the development of tissue engineering techniques to create alternative therapies. This review will detail how we have refined the simple engineering technique of plastic compression of collagen to a process we now call Real Architecture for 3D Tissues (RAFT). The RAFT production process has been standardised, and steps have been taken to consider Good Manufacturing Practice compliance. The evolution of this process has allowed us to create biomimetic epithelial and endothelial tissue equivalents suitable for transplantation and ideal for studying cell-cell interactions in vitro.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2015 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.