Light-activated injectable biomaterials able to change the shape of and thicken a diseased or damaged cornea could herald a plausible alternative to corneal transplantation in the treatment of corneal-thinning disorders. 

Corneal diseases are among the most common causes of blindness. 

The injectable materials – a mixture of biopolymers and custom-made peptides that assemble into a hydrogel when pulsed with low-energy blue light – were able to change the cornea shape and thicken it to varying degrees in an ex vivo pig cornea model. Intracorneal injection of these materials in rats showed the top two materials, G44 and G50, caused no significant inflammation or neovascularisation and remained stable in vivo for six weeks.