Teixeira Ana I, Nealey Paul F, Murphy Christopher J
Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1415 Engineering Drive, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA.
J Biomed Mater Res A. 2004 Dec 1;71(3):369-76. doi: 10.1002/jbm.a.30089.
We have previously shown that human corneal epithelial cells respond to synthetic topographic features with dimensions similar to those found in the native human corneal basement membrane. Epithelial cells integrated inputs from substrate topography and soluble factors in the culture medium to generate alignment responses to substrate topographic anisotropies. Human keratocytes are the main cellular components of the stroma, the tissue that underlies the corneal epithelium. Here we report that keratocytes aligned more strongly than epithelial cells along topographic patterns of grooves and ridges. On patterns with pitches of 800 nm and larger approximately 70% of keratocytes were aligned along the patterns compared to 35% for epithelial cells. On 70 nm-wide ridges on a 400-nm pitch, keratocyte alignment dropped to 45%, whereas epithelial cell alignment remained constant. Similarly to epithelial cells, focal adhesions and associated stress fibers in keratocytes were aligned mainly along the substrate topographies, although oblique orientations were also observed. Furthermore, keratocytes cultured on the nanoscale patterns had fewer stress fibers and focal adhesions than cells cultured on microscale patterns or on smooth substrates.
我们之前已经表明，人类角膜上皮细胞对尺寸与天然人类角膜基底膜中发现的尺寸相似的合成地形特征有反应。上皮细胞整合来自底物地形和培养基中可溶性因子的输入，以产生对底物地形各向异性的排列反应。人类角膜细胞是角膜基质（角膜上皮下方的组织）的主要细胞成分。在此我们报告，角膜细胞比上皮细胞更强烈地沿着沟槽和脊的地形模式排列。在间距为800纳米及更大的模式上，约70%的角膜细胞沿着这些模式排列，而上皮细胞为35%。在间距为400纳米的70纳米宽的脊上，角膜细胞排列降至45%，而上皮细胞排列保持不变。与上皮细胞类似，角膜细胞中的粘着斑和相关应力纤维主要沿着底物地形排列，不过也观察到了倾斜方向。此外，在纳米级模式上培养的角膜细胞比在微米级模式或光滑底物上培养的细胞具有更少的应力纤维和粘着斑。
