University of Delaware 2017 Art in Science
Lens Crafting
Posted on by Dr. Francis Collins
Credit: Salma Muhammad Al Saai, Salil Lachke, University of Delaware, Newark
Live long enough, and there’s a good chance that you will develop a cataract, a clouding of the eye’s lens that impairs vision. Currently, U.S. eye surgeons perform about 3 million operations a year to swap out those clouded lenses with clear, artificial ones [1]. But wouldn’t it be great if we could develop non-surgical ways of preventing, slowing, or even reversing the growth of cataracts? This image, from the lab of NIH-grantee Salil Lachke at the University of Delaware, Newark, is part of an effort to do just that.
Here you can see the process of lens development at work in a tissue cross-section from an adult mouse. In mice, as in people, a single layer of stem-like epithelial cells (far left, blue/green) gives rise to specialized lens cells (middle, blue/green) throughout life. The new cells initially resemble their progenitor cells, displaying nuclei (blue) and the cytoskeletal protein actin (green). But soon these cells will produce vast amounts of water-soluble proteins, called crystallins, to enhance their transparency, while gradually degrading their nuclei to eliminate light-scattering bulk. What remains are fully differentiated, enucleated, non-replicating lens fiber cells (right, green), which refract light onto the retina at the back of the eye.
The Science of Saliva
Posted on by Dr. Francis Collins
Credit: Swati Pradhan-Bhatt, Christiana Care Health System, Newark, DE
Whether it’s salmon sizzling on the grill or pizza fresh from the oven, you probably have a favorite food that makes your mouth water. But what if your mouth couldn’t water—couldn’t make enough saliva? When salivary glands stop working and the mouth becomes dry, either from disease or as a side effect of medical treatment, the once-routine act of eating can become a major challenge.
To help such people, researchers are now trying to engineer replacement salivary glands. While the research is still in the early stages, this image captures a crucial first step in the process: generating 3D structures of saliva-secreting cells (yellow). When grown on a scaffold of biocompatible polymers infused with factors to encourage development, these cells cluster into spherical structures similar to those seen in salivary glands. And they don’t just look like salivary cells, they act like them, producing the distinctive enzyme in saliva, alpha amylase (blue).
