| Our research is aimed toward understanding the ocular surface physiology at a molecular and cellular level for better management of injuries and diseases of the cornea and the conjunctiva and also to improve keratorefractive surgery, a procedure that has become popular in recent years (i.e., PRK, LASIK, etc.).
Currently our main focus is on the ocular surface stem cells - corneal epithelial stem cells and conjunctival epithelial stem cells - that play a central role in ocular surface homeostasis and wound healing. By studying cell proliferation and cell movement - two of the basic parameters of tissue homeostasis, we hope to determine the distribution, movement, turnover, and differentiation of epithelial stem cells and also the presence of stem cell niches and their functions.
We are also investigating a variety of cell movement in the mouse eye by the in vivo time-lapse fluorescence microscopy that we developed. To date we have successfully documented and analyzed movement, in a living mouse, of corneal epithelial cells, conjunctival epithelial cells, corneal stromal cells, leukocytes in the corneal stroma, and corneal blood vessels. By these investigations, we hope to determine molecular regulation of cell movement in vivo, which would help devising an interventional strategy for treating damaged ocular surface as well as developing predictable keratorefractive surgery.
Further information can be found in the following web page:
http://www.columbia.edu/~tn4/research/
|
