The ideal tissue construct for tissue engineering should be indistinguishable from corresponding tissue with its matrix architecture and tissue-specific mechano-responsive properties to promote rapid tissue repair and regeneration with healthy cell differentiation. Stress and pressure responsive biomaterials designed to allow for mechano-transduction mediated tissue remodeling are of special interest for autologous blood vessels engineering scaffolds.Current approaches to tissue engineered vascular grafts require either extensive ex-vivo cell manipulation or are based on non-mechano-responsive biomaterials. Also, synthetic biodegradable polymers that are routinely applied for tissue engineered scaffolds are highly hydrophobic and are not able to provide a native ECM simulating wet environment.We recently discovered that electrospinning (ES) processing of a polymeric blend of poly(L,L-lactide-co-caprolactone)- PLC and Polyvinylpyrrolidone �PVP yields highly hydrophilic shape-memory mechano-responsive biomaterials. Actuating at Tg= 22-230C, the shape recovery starts at ambient conditions with fast restoration of initial shape even after large deformations in air or in water environments. The scaffold almost instantaneously absorbs ~600% w of blood or other biological liquids without swelling or fibers shape changing (Fig.1).  The matrices preserve their liquid absorption ability after drying.As demonstrated by spectroscopy, differential scanning calorimetry and thermogravimetric analysis, strong self-assembly of PLC-PVP occurs in solution and then in ES fibers.In-vivo studies of cell-free PLC-PVP micro/nanofibered tubular seamless vascular grafts (0.6 mm in diameter) in abdominal arterial interposition in a murine model demonstrated high potency of the hydrophilic scaffolding material. All grafts remained patent within the short-term animal survival period (up to 10 days) without any signs of adverse events.

Novel stimuli-responsive hydrophilic synthetic biodegradable micro/nanofibered biomaterials for vascular tissue engineering

248th National Meeting (2014)

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.