| Some visual system diseases can lead to optic nerve injury thus cause blindness, however, there is no satisfactory clinical treatment at the present time, while the optic nerve regeneration research will provide experimental basis for the treatment of these diseases. In this study, we isolated amniotic epithelial cells from rats in the late period of pregnancy. After identifyied by immunocytochemistry and RT-PCR, these cells were cultivated in serum-free medium in vitro to induce them differentiate towards neural stem cells. The differentiated cells were also identifyied by immunocytochemistry and RT-PCR. Then, normal amniotic epithelial cells and induced cells were respectively labeled using fluorescent Hoechst33342 and transplanted into damaged optic nerve of rats, then the Hoechst33342 fluorescent from transplanted cells was tracked, while the retina and optic nerve were stained by HE, Nissl and immunohistochemistry methods to count the number of retinal ganglion cells and evaluate the retinal ganglion cells survival and optic nerve axonal regeneration effect of the transplanting cells. The results showed that the application of serum-free medium can induce rat amniotic epithelial cells to differentiate into neural stem-like cells; Both differentiated and undiferentiated amniotic epithelial cells can survive at the injury site and migrate to both ends of the damaged optic nerve after transplantation, as well as improve the survival rate of retinal ganglion cells and increase cell number of the distal segment of the optic nerve to promote optic nerve axonal regeneration. In contrast, the transplantation of amniotic epithelial cells after induction have better effect on optic nerve repairation than undifferentiated amniotic epithelial cells, suggesting that induced amniotic epithelial cells transplantation can promote the repairation of injured optic nerve, providing a new option for the clinical treatment of optic nerve injury.
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