A standard strain of human ocular keratocytes

The ability of an injured cornea to regenerate from deep tissue trauma is l argely due to wound healing processes mediated by the surviving stromal ker atocytes. Despite the importance of the wound healing process, and the ease with which keratocytes can be grown in tissue culture, a standardised stra in of the cells has never been made available. Accordingly, this study repo rts a strain of human embryonic keratocytes, designated EK1.BR as a researc h tool for the ophthalmic community. EK1.BR has been characterised with res pect to life-span, fraction of dividing cells and maintenance of a keratocy te phenotype in culture. It is hoped that these cells will prove useful in the in vitro study of stromal wound healing and the characterisation of ker atocyte gene expression.