Cytochrome oxidase (CO) activity on alkali-burned rabbit corneas was investigated histochemically to determine the metabolic chanqe in inflamed corneas during wound healing. Cryostat sections of chemically burned and mechanically scraped corneas were stained for CO activity, which is regarded as an index of metabolic activity.Following chemical injury, positive CO activity was detected initially in the vascular endothelial cells of limbal blood vessels. Numerous active polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMNs) and monocytes were found intravascularly and perivascularly. Fibroblasts that appeared at the wound site exhibited marked CO activity around the limbus. Over a period of 13 days, PMNs gradually invaded the central cornea, followed by fibroblasts of high metabolic activity. The areas of PMN infiltration were the same areas in which fibroblasts showed intense staining, suggesting that a PMN-derived mediator or secondary products might affect the activation of fibroblasts.Epithelial resurfacinq was delayed in the chemically burned corneas, although reepithelialization was completed within two to three days in the scraped corneas. Limbal epithelial cells, which recently were suggested as the source of epithelial renewal, showed a remarkable increase of metabolic activity in response to chemical inflammatory stimulation, whereas those in the scraped model did not. This suggests that epithelial cell renewal at the limbus was accelerated in the presence of disturbed reepithelialization.