Latanoprost enhances lymphatic drainage in murine model

Fort Lauderdale, FL-Latanoprost 0.005% (Xalatan, Pfizer), a prostaglandin analogue, stimulates lymphatic drainage in normal mouse eyes, said Alex Tam, MD, who presented the details of his mouse model and the implications of this research.

“The existence of lymphatics in the eye has been questioned for the past century,” said Dr. Tam, of the Department of Ophthalmology & Vision Sciences, Laboratory Medicine & Pathobiology, University of Toronto.

In a previous study, he showed that there is a lymphatic system in the eye. In the current study, he and his colleagues tested if latanoprost enhances lymphatic drainage; 11 male pigmented mice treated with latanoprost and 11 control mice treated with artificial tears were injected in the left anterior chamber with Quantum dot nanocrystals, semiconductor nanoparticles. Hyperspectral fluorescence imaging using Maestro (CRi) was carried out before the injection and 5, 20, 40, and 70 minutes and 2, 6, and 24 hours after injection.

Before the animals were sacrificed, imaging was conducted to locate signals from the nanoparticles. The latanoprost-treated mice had a signal from the left neck early after injection (from 20 to 360 minutes). The earliest signal in the control mice was seen in most mice between 120 and 360 minutes. Immunofluorescence studies showed that the nanoparticles were in the subcapsular region of the left submandibular node in all mice. The signal intensity was increased in latanoprost-treated mice compared with the control mice.

Dr. Tam concluded that latanoprost enhances lymphatic drainage from the normal mouse eye. The lymphatics might be a new therapeutic target to improve fluid drainage from the eye.

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