A thin honeycomb-patterned film as an adhesion barrier in an animal model of glaucoma filtration surgery.

金沢大学附属病院眼科PURPOSE: To evaluate the effectiveness and safety of a thin honeycomb-patterned biodegradable film for glaucoma filtration surgery in rabbits. METHODS: A 7 microm-thick film made from poly(L-lactide-co-epsilon-caprolactone) was placed in the subconjunctival space in one eye of rabbits, with or without full thickness filtration surgery. The film had a honeycomb-patterned surface that faced the subconjunctival Tenon tissue and the other side was smooth. Filtration surgery was also performed in the fellow eye, which received either no adjunctive treatment or 0.4 mg/mL mitomycin C (MMC; n=6 each). Intraocular pressure (IOP) measurements and bleb evaluations using ultrasound biomicroscopy were performed periodically for 28 days after surgery followed by histologic observation. RESULTS: Postoperative IOPs of the film-treated eyes were significantly lower than that of control eyes from day 10 to day 28 (P<0.05), but were not significantly different from those of MMC-treated eyes. The subconjunctival filtration space, detected by ultrasound biomicroscopy, disappeared in 5 control eyes, 1 MMC-treated eye, but none of the film-treated eyes. A bleb leak occurred postoperatively in 2 MMC-treated eyes. Histologically, in eyes without filtration surgery, fibrotic tissue with the film partly attached to it was noted on the honeycomb side, but was minimal on the sclera that faced the smooth side of the film. In eyes with filtration surgery, the honeycomb-patterned film lined the inner bleb wall with minimal inflammatory reaction. CONCLUSIONS: The thin honeycomb-patterned film that attached to the inner bleb wall worked as an adhesion barrier in glaucoma filtration surgery in rabbits, which is worthy of further investigation

Periodic Precipitation during Droplet Evaporation on a Substrate

We present a model of motion and evaporation of a droplet of a solute along with precipitation. It is demonstrated that the model can simulate the formation of stripe patterns parallel to the droplet edge resulting from periodic precipitation

Effect of honeycomb film on protein adsorption, cell adhesion and proliferation

This article describes novel methods for controlling of cell adhesion by using micro porous polymer films. Recently we found the highly ordered micro porous films were formed when poly(ε-caprolactone)(PCL) solution was cast on substrates at high atmospheric humidity. The micro porous film has regular honeycomb morphology with a size of 5 μm per cell (honeycomb film). Endothelial cells grew rapidly on the honeycomb film. After 24 h cell culture, the cell number on honeycomb films was lager than that on PCL flat films. In order to elucidate the effect of honeycomb films as a scaffold for cell culture, the adsorbed proteins on honeycomb films under cell culture condition were observed. After conditioning of the honeycomb film and the flat film in DMEM containing 10 % foetal bovine serum (FBS) for 72 h at 37 ℃ in 5% CO2 atmosphere, the adsorbed fibronectin-FITC and albumin-Texasred on the honeycomb films was observed by using confocal laser scanning microscope (CLSM). The observation revealed that fibronectin showed site-selective adsorption behavior on the honeycomb film. Albumin adsorbed on the honeycomb film non site-selectively, while fibronectin mainly adsorbed on inside of honeycomb pores. On the flat film, fibronectin was hardly observed. Since the honeycomb film accelerates the adsorption of fibronectin which is a typical protein as a cell adhesion molecule, the film could be a scaffold with excellent cell adhesion properties

Biomimetics Image Retrieval Platform

Biomimetics is a new research field that creates innovation through the collaboration of different existing research fields. However, the collaboration, i.e., the exchange of deep knowledge between different research fields, is difficult for several reasons such as differences in technical terms used in different fields. In order to overcome this problem, we have developed a new retrieval platform, “Biomimetics image retrieval platform," using a visualization-based image retrieval technique. A biological database contains a large volume of image data, and by taking advantage of these image data, we are able to overcome limitations of text-only information retrieval. By realizing such a retrieval platform that does not depend on technical terms, individual biological databases of various species can be integrated. This will allow not only the use of data for the study of various species by researchers in different biological fields but also access for a wide range of researchers in fields ranging from materials science, mechanical engineering and manufacturing. Therefore, our platform provides a new path bridging different fields and will contribute to the development of biomimetics since it can overcome the limitation of the traditional retrieval platform