Inspired by the way plants harness and use sunlight, a team of researchers is studying a potential new treatment for dry eye disease.
The study at the National University of Singapore (NUS) uses a light-activated technology derived from the photosynthetic membranes of the spinach plant to help the eye to stay continuously hydrated.
The team, led by Associate Professor David Leong Tai Wei from the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering in the College of Design and Engineering at NUS, transplanted functional plant-derived photosynthetic cells into corneal cells, enabling them to harvest light and produce Nicotinamide Adenine Dinucleotide Phosphate (NADPH), a natural defence against dry eye disease.
Delivered as eye drops in preclinical studies, the treatment reversed corneal damage to near-healthy levels within five days.
It outperformed Restasis, a current treatment for dry eye disease.
It was tested in tear samples from 20 dry eye disease patients at Zhejiang University Eye Hospital in China, increasing NADPH levels 20-fold and reducing hydrogen peroxide, which damages cells, by more than 95%.
In tests on rodents, it reversed corneal damage.
“This is an exciting finding as we have, for the first time, demonstrated that plant photosynthetic machinery can be transplanted into mammalian tissue to generate biologically useful molecules, powered entirely by the same light that enables our vision.” said Dr Xing Kuoran, the first author of the work.
“We, too, can have limited photosynthetic abilities.”
The team plans to conduct clinical trials to further validate the technology.
