Fig 1. Main study design.

All rats underwent a baseline ERG which were labelled as Baseline group. Among these animals 46 underwent intraperitoneal STZ injection and were labelled as Diabetic group afterwards for induced diabetes, the rest did not receive STZ. Diabetic animals were followed for 3 months. At the end of the three months all rats received intravitreal 20x103 bone marrow derived stem cell containing solution into the right eyes and balanced salt solution into the left eyes to make up the Healthy +BMSC, Healthy + Sham, Diabetic +BMSC and Healthy + Sham groups. These groups underwent ERG analysis at 1^st week, 1^st week and 2^nd week after the intravitreal injection and were sacrificed thereafter.