Speaker
Description
"There exists a clear clinical need for adipose tissue reconstruction strategies to repair adipose tissue defects which outperform the currently available approaches. The development of biomimetic materials able to promote cell proliferation and adipogenic differentiation has gained increasing attention in the context of adipose reconstructive purposes. Thiol-norbornene crosslinkable gelatin-based materials were developed and benchmarked to the current commonly applied methacryloyl-modified gelatin (GelMA) with different degrees of substitutions focussing on bottom-up tissue engineering [1].
The developed hydrogels resulted in similar physico-chemical properties (gel fractions >90% and mass swelling ratio ~13). The mechanical properties of the hydrogels could be tuned by incorporating more or less crosslinkable functionalities or using different crosslinking techniques (i.e. step-growth ~15kPa vs chain-growth ~30kPa). The biocompatibility (viability >85%) as well as differentiation potential of encapsulated adipose tissue-derived stem cells were analysed through a live/dead assay, Bodipy/DAPI staining, triglyceride assay as well as a secretome analysis. Additional in vivo experiments are currently ongoing assessing the differentiation potential and neovascularisation via ex vivo histology of constructs implanted sub-mammary in mice. Initial in vivo data already showed good vascularisation throughout the construct one month post-surgery via contrast-enhanced µCT imaging.
It can be concluded that the mechanical properties of a biomaterial are of utmost importance with respect to differentiation into the adipogenic lineage. The mechanical cues of GelNB55/SH75 were superior over the other investigated hydrogels. Photo-crosslinkable thiol-ene systems thus offer a promising strategy toward adipose tissue engineering through cell encapsulation compared to the widely used GelMA.
Akwnowledgements
L. Van Damme would like to acknowledge the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO) for providing her with an FWO-SB fellowships (1S85120N). Prof. Blondeel and Prof. Van Vlierberghe would also like to thank FWO for providing them with an FWO fellowship (G056219N)
References
[1] Van Damme L, Van Hoorick J, Blondeel P, Van Vlierberghe S. Toward Adipose Tissue Engineering Using Thiol-Norbornene Photo-Crosslinkable Gelatin Hydrogels. Biomacromolecules. 2021;22(6):2408–18.
[2] Van Den Bulcke AI, Bogdanov B, De Rooze N, Schacht EH, Cornelissen M, Berghmans H. Structural and rheological properties of methacrylamide modified gelatin hydrogels. Biomacromolecules. 2000;1(1):31–8."
94238155089
