IMPROVED BIOCOMPATIBILITY OF CONTACT LENSES

隐形眼镜使视力受损的患者不必经常佩戴 笨重且令人分心的眼镜。病人有一种 多种类型的隐形眼镜可供选择，包括聚甲基丙烯酸甲酯 硬镜片，可透气的醋酸丁酸纤维素或硅橡胶 镜片，或甲基丙烯酸羟乙酯水凝胶软镜片。一些扩展 佩戴隐形眼镜甚至可以在人睡觉时佩戴。然而，所有的 这些镜片表现出氧气减少和由此造成的损害的问题。 新陈代谢与蛋白质、脂肪和盐类的不可逆沉积 从泪液流到晶状体上。这会导致佩戴者的不适， 可能的接触不耐受，视力下降，有用的东西减少 联系人的生命周期。在第一阶段项目中，我们共价耦合 亲水性聚合物到水凝胶接触材料的表面。这 导致模型中蛋白质和固醇沉积的延迟 泪液。表面改性不会引起任何骚动或 对培养的角膜上皮细胞的毒性效应或当 动物模型戴的是隐形眼镜。在这个项目中，我们计划继续 通过这项工作，优化了化学和条件，以改变几个 隐形眼镜材料的类型，并对改装后的镜片进行详尽的测试 在体外和体内动物模型中。我们预计这个项目将 从而提高隐形眼镜的生物相容性。

Contacts have freed the vision impaired patient from wearing often cumbersome and cosmetically distracting spectacles. The patient has a choice of many types of contact lenses, including polymethylmethacrylate hard lenses, cellulose acetate butyrate or silicone rubber gas permeable lenses, or hydroxyethylmethacrylate hydrogel soft lenses. Some extended wear lenses can even be worn while the person sleeps. However, all of these lenses exhibit problems decreased oxygen and resulting impaired metabolism and the irreversible deposition of proteins, lipids, and salts from the tear fluids onto the lenses. This results in wearer discomfort, possible contact intolerance, decreased visual acuity and decreased useful lifetime of the contact. In the Phase I project we covalently coupled hydrophilic polymers to the surface of hydrogel contact materials. This resulted in the retardation of protein and sterol deposition from a model tear fluid. The surface modification did not cause any irriatant or toxicity effects to corneal epithelial cells in culture or when the contacts were worn by animal models. In this project we plan to continue with this work, optimize the chemistry and conditions for modifying several types of contact lens materials, and exhaustively test the modified lenses in vitro and in vivo in animal models. We expect that this project will lead to the production of improved biocompatibility of contact lenses.