Corneal wound healing in an osteopontin-deficient mouse.
OBJECTIVE
To investigate the effects of loss of osteopontin (OPN) in the healing of the injured cornea in mice. Cell culture study was also conducted to clarify the effects of OPN in fibroblast behaviors.


METHODS
Ocular fibroblasts from wild-type (WT) and OPN-null (KO) mice were used to study the role of OPN on cell behavior. The effect of the lack of OPN on corneal wound healing was evaluated in mice.


RESULTS
In cell culture, OPN is involved in cell adhesion and in the migration of ocular fibroblasts. Adhesion of the corneal epithelial cell line was not affected by exogenous OPN. OPN was upregulated in a healing, injured mouse cornea. Loss of OPN did not affect epithelial healing after simple epithelial debridement. Healing of an incision injury in cornea was delayed, with less appearance of myofibroblasts and transforming growth factor beta1 expression in a KO mouse than in a WT mouse. The absence of OPN promoted tissue destruction after an alkali burn, resulting in a higher incidence of corneal perforation in KO mice than in WT mice.


CONCLUSIONS
OPN modulates wound healing-related fibroblast behavior and is required to restore the physiological structure of the cornea after wound healing.
Miyazaki
Ken-ichi
K
Department of Ophthalmology, Wakayama Medical University, Wakayama, Japan.
Okada
Yuka
Y
Yamanaka
Osamu
O
Kitano
Ai
A
Ikeda
Kazuo
K
Kon
Shigeyuki
S
Uede
Toshimitsu
T
Rittling
Susan R
SR
Denhardt
David T
DT
Kao
Winston Whei-Yang
WW
Saika
Shizuya
S
D000818:Animals; D002057:Burns, Chemical / Q000378:metabolism; D002448:Cell Adhesion / Q000187:drug effects; D018929:Cell Culture Techniques; D002465:Cell Movement / Q000187:drug effects; D003319:Corneal Stroma / Q000293:injuries*; D003646:Debridement; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D005126:Eye Burns / Q000139:chemically induced; D005347:Fibroblasts / Q000187:drug effects; D006023:Glycoproteins / Q000494:pharmacology / Q000502:physiology*; D051379:Mice; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D018345:Mice, Knockout; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; D012972:Sodium Hydroxide; D053773:Transforming Growth Factor beta1 / Q000378:metabolism; D014945:Wound Healing / Q000502:physiology*
D006023:Glycoproteins; D053773:Transforming Growth Factor beta1; C024229:osteopoietin; D012972:Sodium Hydroxide