%0 Journal Article
%T Tissue Engineering of the Corneal Endothelium: A Review of Carrier Materials
%A Juliane Teichmann
%A Monika Valtink
%A Mirko Nitschke
%A Stefan Gramm
%A Richard H.W. Funk
%A Katrin Engelmann
%A Carsten Werner
%J Journal of Functional Biomaterials
%D 2013
%I MDPI AG
%R 10.3390/jfb4040178
%X Functional impairment of the human corneal endothelium can lead to corneal blindness. In order to meet the high demand for transplants with an appropriate human corneal endothelial cell density as a prerequisite for corneal function, several tissue engineering techniques have been developed to generate transplantable endothelial cell sheets. These approaches range from the use of natural membranes, biological polymers and biosynthetic material compositions, to completely synthetic materials as matrices for corneal endothelial cell sheet generation. This review gives an overview about currently used materials for the generation of transplantable corneal endothelial cell sheets with a special focus on thermo-responsive polymer coatings.
%K tissue engineering
%K corneal endothelium
%K corneal endothelial cell sheets
%K natural membranes
%K biological polymers
%K thermo-responsive polymers
%K physicochemical properties
%K biomolecular functionalization
%U http://www.mdpi.com/2079-4983/4/4/178