Cultivation of keratinocytes on poly HEMA and their migration after inversion.

This study demonstrates how the pretreatment of poly HEMA disks with bovine serum influences the adhesion of human keratinocytes in vitro. The ability of these cells to migrate from poly HEMA disks to a polystyrene petri dish surface colonized with irradiated 3T3 cells is also evaluated. The stimulatory effect of 24-h preincubation of the poly HEMA disks with bovine serum on the keratinocyte adhesion and growth was dependent on the concentration of the serum used. The keratinocytes migrated from the poly HEMA disks to polystyrene colonized with irradiated 3T3 cells. The numerous cells which migrated from the poly HEMA were positive for cytokeratin 10 (suprabasal layers) after 3 weeks and for cytokeratin 1 (cornified layer) after 1 month. These results seem to be encouraging for further experiments with respect to clinical application.