Remodelling 3D printed GelMA-HA corneal scaffolds by cornea stromal cells

Engineering scaffolds with a structure mimicking that of native cornea allows for addressing the severe donor shortage for the corneal blindness treatment, which, however, remains challenging. In the light that corneal stromal (CS) cells can play a key role in corneal stroma formation, in this study we incorporated CS cells into three-dimensional (3D) scaffolds printed from hyaluronic acid-modified gelatin-methacrylate (GelMA-HA) scaffolds and characterized the scaffolds in terms of remodeled extracellular matrix (ECM) in vitro. Our results illustrated that the modification of GelMA by HA allowed for 3D printing of corneal scaffolds and further improved the characteristics of primary rabbit-derived corneal stromal cells for remodelling scaffolds. After 60 days, we decellularized the remodeled corneal scaffolds and examined their optical properties; and our results demonstrated that the 3D printed corneal scaffolds provided CS cells with cues that guided them toward the directional and spatial organization and facilitated the ECM remodelling.