Figure 2.

Photoreceptor Precursors in a Non-lesioned Retina Remained Confined to the Subretinal Space

(A) A blue autofluorescence SLO image of the bleb and transplanted cells is shown. Autofluorescence from disrupted RPE can be seen in the central bleb as well as tdTomato fluorescence from the transplanted cells at the inferior margin of the bleb. The region bounded by the red box was imaged using FAOSLO and AOSLO NIR reflectance imaging for 14 weeks.

(B) Merged fluorescence (red) and NIR reflectance (gray) AOSLO images taken at 6, 11, and 14 weeks post transplant are shown.

(C) OCT of the region containing the transplanted cells along an axis corresponding to the blue line shown in (A) is shown.

(D–I) CRX^/tdTomato+ cells always co-labeled with a human cytoplasm-specific antibody, confirming that these cells were of human origin. Additional retinal cell types from the dissociated organoids were also present (i.e., human cytoplasm+/CRX^/tdTomato-cells). Photoreceptor precursors demonstrated expression of cone (E and F) and rod markers (G), Some human cytoplasm+/GFAP⁺ glial cells were also present within the cell cluster (H), while proliferative cells were minimal (I).