In vitro susceptibility of microorganisms isolated from cold stored corneas: increased gentamicin-resistance in cornea banking.

Donor cornea contamination is one of the major risks for corneal transplants. The use of antibiotics in storage media remains as one of the most important security measurements to minimize the contamination risk in corneal preservation. Since antibiotic resistance among microorganisms have been rising gradually, it is important to gain knowledge about the antimicrobial susceptibility pattern for choosing the most suitable antimicrobial agents.

Modulating the strength of hydrogen bond acceptors to achieve low Caco2 efflux for oral bioavailability of PARP inhibitors blocking centrosome clustering.

During the lead generation and optimization of PARP inhibitors blocking centrosome clustering, it was discovered that increasing hydrogen bond acceptor (HBA) strength improved cellular potency but led to elevated Caco2 and MDR1 efflux and thus poor oral bioavailability. Conversely, compounds with lower efflux had reduced potency. The project team was able to improve the bioavailability by reducing efflux through systematic modifications to the strength of the HBA by changing the electronic properties of neighboring groups, whilst maintaining sufficient acceptor strength for potency.

Nucleic acid-amplification testing for hepatitis B in cornea donors.

Careful donor selection and implementation of tests of appropriate sensitivity and specificity are of paramount importance for minimizing the risk of transmitting infectious diseases from donors to corneal allograft recipients. Reported cases of viral transmission with corneal grafts are very unusual. Nevertheless potential virus transmission through the engraftment cannot be ruled out.

Flex center method versus center method for endothelial corneal evaluation in eye banking: a comparative analysis.

Specular microscopy can provide a non-invasive morphological analysis of the cornea endothelial cell layer. A variety of analysis programs are available to determine corneal endothelial quality. The flex-center endothelial analysis method (Konan Inc) is a newer technique including the outermost digitized cells and thus increases the number of cells for analysis.