Abstract
Abstract
Purpose:
Biohcly is a type of acidic nanoclustered water shown to exert an antimicrobial effect and play a role in the tissue-healing process in previous experiments. This study was performed to evaluate the in vivo effects of Biohcly treatment on mechanical corneal wound healing.
Methods:
Rabbit cornea “acute” mechanical wounds were created with an 8-mm hydraulic pressure trephine. The corneal wounds were treated with either Biohcly (left eye) or sterile saline (right eye) 4 times per day. To determine the state of the wounds, the wound healing rate (WHR), inflammatory index (IF), neovascularization, and anterior segment optical coherence tomography (AS-OCT) were evaluated. The expression of inflammatory factors was examined by quantitative real-time reverse transcriptional polymerase chain reaction, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay, and immunohistochemical staining.
Results:
Biohcly was more effective than saline in healing corneal ulcers as demonstrated by the WHR calculated on the 9th and 14th days after surgery (P < 0.05). The histological and AS-OCT examinations revealed better regeneration and reduced corneal scars in the Biohcly-treated corneas. No neovascularization formed in the corneas treated with Biohcly, whereas 25% of the saline-treated wounds developed this complication. In addition, the IF scores of the Biohcly-treated wounds were significantly lower than those of the saline-treated wounds. Compared with the right-eye corneas, the left-eye corneas had much lower protein and mRNA levels of matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP-9) after the injury.
Conclusions:
Biohcly plays a role in wound healing and anti-inflammation in the treatment of corneal wounds. The downregulation of MMP-9 in the Biohcly-treated corneas might have been responsible for this effect.
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