Patient deaths resulting from cardiovascular diseases are increasing across the globe, posing the greatest risk to patients in developed countries. Myocardial infarction, as a result of inadequate blood flow to the myocardium, results in irreversible loss of cardiomyocytes which can lead to heart failure. A sequela of myocardial infarction is scar formation that can alter the normal myocardial architecture and result in arrhythmias. Over the past decade, a myriad of tissue engineering approaches has been developed to fabricate engineered scaffolds for repairing cardiac tissue. This paper highlights the recent application of electrically conductive nanomaterials (carbon and gold-based nanomaterials, electroactive polymers) to the development of scaffolds for cardiac tissue engineering. Moreover, this work summarizes the effects of these nanomaterials on cardiac cell behavior such as proliferation and migration, as well as cardiomyogenic differentiation in stem cells.

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Among several attempts to integrate tissue engineering concepts into strategies to repair different parts of the human body, neuronal repair stands as a challenging area due to the complexity of the structure and function of the nervous system and the low efficiency of conventional repair approaches. Herein, electrospun polyvinyl alcohol (PVA)/chitosan nano-fibrous scaffolds have been synthesized with large pore sizes as potential matrices for nervous tissue engineering and repair. PVA fibers were modified through blending with chitosan and porosity of scaffolds was measured at various levels of their depth through an image analysis method. In addition, the structural, physicochemical, biodegradability, and swelling of the chitosan nanofibrous scaffolds were evaluated. The chitosan-containing scaffolds were used for in vitro cell culture in contact with PC12 nerve cells, and they were found to exhibit the most balanced properties to meet the basic required specifications for nerve cells. It could be concluded that addition of chitosan to the PVA scaffolds enhances viability and proliferation of nerve cells, which increases the biocompatibility of the scaffolds. In fact, addition of a small percentage of chitosan to the PVA scaffolds proved to be a promising approach for synthesis of a neural-friendly polymeric blend.