Hydrogels are widely utilized in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine due to their unique physicochemical properties, making them especially attractive as synthetic extracellular matrices for soft tissue constructs. Polysaccharides derived from natural sources such as hyaluronic acid are an excellent choice of biomaterials due to their innate biocompatibility, but these materials often lack structural integrity. However, this issue can be addressed by chemically crosslinking the polysaccharide which in turn allows for controlled mechanical properties (i.e. stiffness, degradation). In addition, peptides and proteins can be immobilized to the hydrogels to further enhance the bioactivity (i.e. cell adhesion). In our lab, we have synthesized methacrylate-functionalized hyaluronic acid for use in neural stem cell studies. The successful conjugation of methacrylate groups to hyaluronic acid in a one-step reaction is confirmed by HNMR. The methacrylated hyaluronic acid is able to undergo photo-initiated radical polymerization to form a hydrogel. Rheology measurements indicate a stable structure exhibiting elastic properties (G’ &gt; G”). Furthermore, additions to the methacrylate groups allows for versatile crosslinking and conjugations chemistries to be performed to further optimize the hydrogel for neural stem cell culture. The viability and differentiation of encapsulated human neural stem cells were determined and compared with traditional culture methods using a laminin-coated plastic surface.

Utilization of hyaluronic acid-based hydrogels for neural stem cell engineering

252nd National Meeting (2016)

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