Immunohistochemical detection of heat shock protein 27 and Ki-67 in human pterygium
- Department of Ophthalmology, School of Medicine, University of Patras, Patras 26500, Greece
- Department of Anatomy, School of Medicine
- University of Patras
- Accepted 14 March 2001
- Department of Ophthalmology, School of Medicine, University of Patras, Patras 26500, Greece
- Department of Anatomy, School of Medicine
- University of Patras
- Nikolaos Pharmakakis, MD, Department of Ophthalmology, School of Medicine, University of Patras, 26500 Greece npharmak{at}med.upatras.gr
- Accepted 14 March 2001
Editor,—Pterygium, a disorder of the ocular surface, consists of atrophic conjunctival epithelium and a highly vascularised hypertrophic and elastotic degenerated connective tissue. Ultraviolet irradiation is considered to be the principal environmental factor through an effect on the basal stem cells on the nasal limbus and activation of the fibroblasts.1-3 Previous studies have detected chromosomal allelic loss in slightly over 50% of pterygia and a low frequency of microsatellite instability.4 However, no differences in cellular proliferation between pterygial and normal conjunctival tissue have been detected with flow cytometry.5 On the other hand, a recent report suggests that pterygium may be the result of a failure of appropriate cellular apoptosis.6 We studied 17 pterygia and 12 normal conjunctiva tissues from the nasal conjunctiva for the expression of heat shock protein 27 (Hsp27) and cell …
