As I mentioned in the What Is Keratoconus page, keratoconus (KC) is an eye condition where the structure of the cornea distorts, thins out and becomes cone-shaped. One of the more recent and successful treatments in halting the progression of KC is corneal collagen cross-linking (CXL). The following video is a pretty good in describing, and then showing, the procedure itself. If you want to skip to the uncomfortable cutting bits and avoid the boring words, it’s from 1.00 onwards.

This technique is designed to ‘fix’ the collagen in the cornea in place so that progression is halted. It does that by reacting the collagen with riboflavin in order to cross link the polymer structure and make it more rigid.

Danger! Ahead be Chemistry!

The mechanism of this reaction was investigated in 2010 by McCall et al. who looked at a variety of pathways and elucidated which one was the…