Stem cells hold great promise to increase regenerative capacity in traumatic injuries, but current technologies suffer limitations. Specifically, the recruitment, retention, and differentiation of stem cells into functional cells at the site of injury in vivo remain a challenge. The native healing process is critical and mediated by a variety of biological pathways that rely on physiochemical cues, including growth factors, enzymes, and proteins. Recent work has found that synthetic small molecules and simple signaling ions can be used to modulate stem cell differentiation as effectively as growth factors, leading these pluripotent cells to their specialized function. However, there is no suitable technology to administer these small molecules in a sustained fashion at the site of regeneration. To enable stem cell driven regeneration, a scaffold must be designed that has the ability to recruit stem cells, and support their retention as they differentiate into functional tissue.  To this end, synthetic materials and composite scaffolds with the potential to direct the healing response hold the key to the extension of stem cell-driven healing.<br/>A particularly promising composite component for bone regeneration is graphene, an atomic sheet formed of double bonded carbon atoms, that is easily chemically modified to yield graphene oxide (GO) and other functional graphenic materials. Functional graphenic materials (FGMs) offer excellent and tunable mechanical properties, degradability, and controllable surface chemistry that can be translated to tunable bioactivity. In the Sydlik Group, we have developed chemical procedures that allow us transform graphite into a degradable, cell-instructive polyphosphate or peptide modified graphene scaffold that recapitulates the properties of native tissue to instruct stem cell based healing. Starting from graphite, we oxidize to graphene oxide (GO) and perform further chemistry to give initiate polymerization to synthesize polymer functionalized graphenes. These functional graphenic materials can be processed into constructs that offer excellent and tunable mechanical properties, degradability, controllable surface chemistry, and potential biocompatibility. The chemical and material properties of these materials are being optimized for use in biodegradable scaffolds for tissue regeneration.

Polymer functionalized graphenic materials as stem cell instructive scaffolds for tissue regeneration

256th National Meeting (2018)

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