Basement membrane formation during wound healing is dependent on epidermaltransplants

The purpose of the study was to compare directly the effect of healing and the formation of the basement membrane during wound healing from two autolo gous primary keratinocyte cultures in the liquid environment in full-thickn ess wounds in pigs. Wounds were either transplanted with cultured epidermal autografts (n = 26) or autologous keratinocyte suspensions (n = 24) or tre ated with saline alone (n = 40) and covered with a chamber. All wounds tran splanted with cultured epidermal autografts and keratinocyte cell suspensio ns had positive "take" after transplantation. Healing times were significan tly shorter for wounds treated with either cultured epidermal autografts or keratinocyte suspensions (p = 0.0001) compared with saline-treated wounds but were not different from each other (p = 0.1835). There were no differen ces in cytokeratin and laminin expression; however, staining with monoclona l antibody against collagen type VII showed a lower signal for cultured epi dermal autografts only on days 8 and 16 compared with keratinocyte suspensi ons. Electron microscope evaluation showed a higher incidence of anchoring fibrils and a more mature dermal-epidermal junction in wounds treated with keratinocyte cell suspensions at day 8. These findings map be due to die si ngle, noncontact-inhibited cells and the early formation of an in vivo neod ermis to the wet wound environment. These data suggest that wounds transpla nted with autologous keratinocyte suspensions in a wet environment may be a n alternative method in the treatment of wounds.