Adhikari Bikram, Barakoti Prasanga, Pantcheva Mina B, Krebs Melissa D
Colorado School of Mines, Quantitative Biosciences and Engineering, Golden, Colorado, USA.
Ophthalmology, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Aurora, Colorado, USA.
Biotechnol Bioeng. 2025 Jan;122(1):69-79. doi: 10.1002/bit.28849. Epub 2024 Sep 18.
Glaucoma, a progressive eye disease leading to irreversible blindness, currently affects over 70 million people globally. Elevated intraocular pressure (IOP) is implicated in its development. IOP is carefully regulated by the trabecular meshwork (TM). However, studying TM behavior has been limited to traditional tissue culture studies or costly ex vivo cultures of animal and donor eyes. Developing novel functional TM models could enhance cell/tissue behavior understanding and aid therapeutic development for glaucoma. In this study, we 3D printed a simplified and reproducible model of the human TM (hTM) and studied hTM cell behavior under static and dynamic cultures. Gelatin Methacryloyl bioinks proved suitable for printing with viable and proliferative hTM cells expressing crucial marker genes in response to glucocorticoid induction. This, to our knowledge, is the first functional 3D printed hTM model and aims to facilitate TM research. Moreover, this easily reproducible model could also be applicable in the study of numerous other cell types throughout the body.
青光眼是一种导致不可逆失明的进行性眼病，目前全球有超过7000万人受其影响。眼内压升高与青光眼的发病有关。小梁网（TM）精细调节眼内压。然而，对小梁网行为的研究一直局限于传统的组织培养研究或对动物和供体眼进行的昂贵的离体培养。开发新型功能性小梁网模型可以增进对细胞/组织行为的理解，并有助于青光眼治疗方法的开发。在本研究中，我们3D打印了一个简化且可重复的人小梁网（hTM）模型，并研究了hTM细胞在静态和动态培养条件下的行为。甲基丙烯酰化明胶生物墨水被证明适用于与在糖皮质激素诱导下表达关键标记基因的有活力且可增殖的hTM细胞一起进行打印。据我们所知，这是首个功能性3D打印hTM模型，旨在促进小梁网研究。此外，这个易于复制的模型也可应用于全身众多其他细胞类型的研究。
