Mechanical reinforcement of urinary bladder matrix by electrospun polycaprolactone nanofibers

Document Type : Article

Authors

1 Department of Stem Cells and Developmental Biology, Cell Science Research Center, Royan Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Technology, ACECR, Tehran, Iran

2 Urology and Nephrology Research Center, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

3 Department of Developmental Biology, University of Science and Culture, ACECR, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

For a successful bladder tissue repair and reconstruction, fabrication of scaffolds with proper biochemical and biomechanical characteristics is necessary. Decellularized bladder tissue has been proposed in previous studies as a gold standard material for scaffold fabrication. However, the weak mechanical properties for such load-bearing tissue has remained a challenge. Incorporation of both biological and synthetic materials has been known as an effective strategy for improving mechanical and biological properties of the scaffolds. In present work, a simple process is developed to fabricate hybrid hydrogel scaffolds with a biomimetic architecture from the natural urinary bladder extracellular matrix (ECM) and synthetic polycaprolactone (PCL) nanofibers, in order to obtain a scaffold with optimized mechanical and biological properties for bladder tissue engineering. To this gaol, the ECM gel was derived from rat bladder and the electrospun PCL nanofibers was embedded within the gel, followed by incubating the composite to shape the hybrid hydrogel. These reinforced scaffolds showed more structural integrity and mechanical stability. The introduced concept of nanofiber-reinforced ECM can be applied as a promising platform in engineering of bladder or other load-bearing soft tissues.

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Scientia Iranica
Volume 24, Issue 6 - Serial Number 6
Transactions on Nanotechnology (F)
November and December 2017
Pages 3476-3480

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