Development of Silica-Collagen Composite as Corneal Substitute through Sol-Gel Additive Manufacturing

Abstract

Abstract The inherent properties of the healthy cornea, namely its strength, transparency and precise curvature enable it to withstand external injury and provides resistant to intraocular pressure, also allowing 95% transmission of incoming lightand providing 70% of the focusing power of the eye. Corneal transparency is dependent on the specific arrangement of collagen within the stroma. The research thrives for synthesis of a composite comprised of Collagen, the basic protein that can be abundantly found in human body and silica which is biosafe and biocompatible to physiological system and can act as a scaffold for tissue engineering and drug delivery. The starting materials of the synthesis are diluted Silica precursor and two types of collagen-I and III. Collagen type III is predominantly found on the epithelium and endothelium of the cornea which can enhance the mechanical property and optical property of the hybrid. Sol Gel technique has been applied for the synthesis of the composite and finally lyophilized after the pH has been stabilized around 7.2-7.4 to obtain dehydrated silica collagen composite. Optical property of the developed composite closely mimics the collagen hybrids from earlier work in this field. The composite exhibits crystallinity due to the presence of silica as it evidenced from its XRD plot. Other material characterizations, viz. FTIR and SEM have been performed on the sample to identify the microstructural nature of the composite.