Tilapia skin is wealthy in collagen, and this structural protein’s abundance has produced the fish a preferred useful resource in veterinary and human medication. Scientists have explored its use in applications from bandaging burn victims and correcting belly hernias to mending heart valves and reconstructing vaginas.

Inspired by colleagues in a dozen other specialties, Mirza Melo, a veterinary ophthalmologist in northeastern Brazil’s Ceará condition, examined tilapia skin to take care of a pervasive issue in her area: corneal ulcers and perforations, notably in dogs with short snouts. “These are species with pretty popular eyes,” she says. “So they get hurt normally.“

This kind of corneal injuries are normally dealt with by surgically positioning a membrane created of horse placenta (also a collagen resource but with a reduce focus than tilapia pores and skin, Melo states) more than the impacted place to assistance it regenerate. Melo initially swapped that membrane for tilapia pores and skin in 2019, when she properly operated on a Shih Tzu with a significant corneal perforation.

Brazil’s Melt away Support Institute and the Federal College of Ceará—home of the Tilapia Skin Task, which pioneered the skin’s use to treat burns—approached her about the surgical method. With their help Melo started screening a membrane she identified as the acellular dermal matrix (ADM), produced of pure collagen extracted from the fish pores and skin.

Collagen is recognised to promote cellular progress and to “guide the era of a variety of tissues,” Melo says. A tilapia’s collagen offer and top quality continue to be large during the fish’s full life, while horse-placenta collagen differs relying on variables such as the animal’s age and pounds, she claims.

The processed ADM resembles a thick sheet of paper. Veterinarians rehydrate it with saline solution right before surgery, then lay it about a dog’s corneal lesion and suture it into position, in which it functions as scaffolding for regenerating cells.

The 400-moreover canine Melo has handled so considerably have demonstrated no discomfort or issues with an infection right after surgery. They also healed swiftly, with minimum scarring that would impact postsurgical care.

Current corneal mend strategies these kinds of as utilizing horse placenta, grafting and transplant have good results—but scarring proceeds to be a worry, claims Robson Santos, a veterinary ophthalmologist not included in the ADM task. “Tilapia skin is an outstanding choice to the nicely-founded techniques we now have,” he claims.

Melo is now wanting to use the approach on cats, and she suggests discussions have by now started on how to adapt it for individuals. She also hopes to just take her analysis to the eye’s retina, which is especially challenging to handle mainly because of its incredibly sensitive specialised neurons.

“It’s exactly where we have the most limited resources, in both of those veterinary and human ophthalmology,” Melo claims. “So we hope to get there one particular working day.”