[Morphology of the cellular growth of organ cultures of fetal crystalline lens].

144 crystalline lenses of swine fetuses, 10 to 20 Mm long, were organ-cultured for up to 42 days in Eagles medium or DMEM in combination with 6% or 20% fetal calf serum. The types of cells detected included epithelioid and infiltrating cells (in 11.1% of lenses), fibroblast-like cells (in 20.8% of lenses) and vesicular cells (in 49.3% of lenses). These cell types characteristic of pathological (cataract-affected) lenses in vivo are absent in normal lenses. According to the data obtained, long-term organ culture of the fetal eye lens may be used as an experimental model of cataractogenesis.