RGD surface functionalization of the hydrophilic acrylic intraocular lens material to control posterior capsular opacification

PLoS One. 2014 Dec 11;9(12):e114973. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0114973. eCollection 2014.

Abstract

Posterior Capsular Opacification (PCO) is the capsule fibrosis developed on implanted IntraOcular Lens (IOL) by the de-differentiation of Lens Epithelial Cells (LECs) undergoing Epithelial Mesenchymal Transition (EMT). Literature has shown that the incidence of PCO is multifactorial including the patient's age or disease, surgical technique, and IOL design and material. Reports comparing hydrophilic and hydrophobic acrylic IOLs have shown that the former has more severe PCO. On the other hand, we have previously demonstrated that the adhesion of LECs is favored on hydrophobic compared to hydrophilic materials. By combining these two facts and contemporary knowledge in PCO development via the EMT pathway, we propose a biomimetically inspired strategy to promote LEC adhesion without de-differentiation to reduce the risk of PCO development. By surface grafting of a cell adhesion molecule (RGD peptide) onto the conventional hydrophilic acrylic IOL material, the surface-functionalized IOL can be used to reconstitute a capsule-LEC-IOL sandwich structure, which has been considered to prevent PCO formation in literature. Our results show that the innovative biomaterial improves LEC adhesion, while also exhibiting similar optical (light transmittance, optical bench) and mechanical (haptic compression force, IOL injection force) properties compared to the starting material. In addition, compared to the hydrophobic IOL material, our bioactive biomaterial exhibits similar abilities in LEC adhesion, morphology maintenance, and EMT biomarker expression, which is the crucial pathway to induce PCO. The in vitro assays suggest that this biomaterial has the potential to reduce the risk factor of PCO development.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Capsule Opacification / pathology*
  • Capsule Opacification / surgery
  • Cataract / pathology
  • Cataract / therapy*
  • Cataract Extraction / adverse effects
  • Cell Adhesion / drug effects
  • Cell Dedifferentiation / drug effects
  • Cell Line
  • Epithelial Cells / drug effects
  • Epithelial Cells / pathology
  • Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition / drug effects*
  • Humans
  • Lenses, Intraocular / adverse effects*
  • Prostheses and Implants / adverse effects
  • Swine

Grants and funding

This study was financed by project LINOLA (1117465) from Walloon region, Belgium (http://recherchetechnologie.wallonie.be/). YSH and MCG received the funding. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. DB and CP are employees of PhysIOL. PhysIOL provided support in the form of salaries for authors DB and CP, as well as the materials and installations for performing part of the research activities (i.e. plasma equipment, optical bench, haptic compression force measuring equipment), and had additional role in the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, and preparation of the manuscript. The specific roles of these authors are articulated in the ‘author contributions' section.