1. Maintaining the ocular surface of the eye: the role of corneal epithelial stem cells in health and disease Mary Ann Stepp, Ph. D. Professor Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology and of Ophthalmology

2. How are the corneal epithelial stem cells maintained throughout our lifetime within their niche at the limbus despite all the insults the ocular surface is forced to endure?

3. Some problems that can arise on the ocular surface… After PRK Recurrent Erosion Corneal Epithelial Stem Cell Deficiency (CESCD)

4. Some problems that can arise on the ocular surface… After PRK Recurrent Erosion Corneal Epithelial Stem Cell Deficiency (CESCD) Development of mouse model for the study of these conditions

5. The cornea is optically well suited for microscopic analysis  4 integrin whole mount

6. The cornea is optically well suited for microscopic analysis  4 integrin whole mount

9. To get at the mechanism of these affects, we have a cell culture model we are using to study cell adhesion and migration.

12. Many important questions remain but we believe we have a model system that continues to give us new insight into the how cell adhesion regulates the stem cell niche. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION!