Concise Review: Tailoring Bioengineered Scaffolds for Stem Cell Applications in Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine

Abstract

The potential for the clinical application of stem cells in tissue regeneration is clearly significant. However, this potential has remained largely unrealized owing to the persistent challenges in reproducibly, with tight quality criteria, and expanding and controlling the fate of stem cells in vitro and in vivo. Tissue engineering approaches that rely on reformatting traditional Food and Drug Administrationapproved biomedical polymers from fixation devices to porous scaffolds have been shown to lack the complexity required for in vitro stem cell culture models or translation to in vivo applications with high efficacy. This realization has spurred the development of advanced mimetic biomaterials and scaffolds to increasingly enhance our ability to control the cellular microenvironment and, consequently, stem cell fate. New insights into the biology of stem cells are expected to eventuate from these advances in material science, in particular, from synthetic hydrogels that display physicochemical properties reminiscent of the natural cell microenvironment and that can be engineered to display or encode essential biological cues. Merging these advanced biomaterials with high-throughput methods to systematically, and in an unbiased manner, probe the role of scaffold biophysical and biochemical elements on stem cell fate will permit the identification of novel key stem cell behavioral effectors, allow improved in vitro replication of requisite in vivo niche functions, and, ultimately, have a profound impact on our understanding of stem cell biology and unlock their clinical potential in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. STEM CELLS TRANSLATIONAL MEDICINE 2015;4:156-164

Paving the Way Toward Complex Blood-Brain Barrier Models Using Pluripotent Stem Cells

“…Stem cells, therefore, require a mechanical substrate to grow on, as well as soluble factors that regulate their fate. Important factors of the niche in vivo may be secreted from other cells, the ECM, paracrine factors, and metabolites [106]. Many of these characteristics require recapitulation in vitro, and this can partly be achieved by using innovative (bio-) materials and microfabrication techniques to modify the culture environment systematically [107].…”

“…in vitro [106]. We envision several applications where novel biomaterials might be applied: First, novel materials might help to overcome certain limitations of the materials used for the filter membranes in transwell in vitro BBB models.…”

Commercializing Electrospun Scaffolds For Pluripotent Stem Cell-Based Tissue Engineering Applications

“…In particular, defined electrospun scaffolds can serve as alternative to animal derived matrices, like Matrigel, which is often used to coat 2D substrates for expanding undifferentiated PSCs. 3D hydrogels have also been evaluated as a tool for PSC expansion as recently reviewed [77,78]. One study determined that aligned and random PCL, PLGA, and poly (L-lactic acid) (PLLA) electrospun substrates supported the culture and expansion of human ESCs [79].…”

Tailoring Bioengineered Scaffolds for Regenerative Medicine

“…Tissue bioengineered scaffolds targeted for in vivo applications are typically restricted to a thickness of only a few hundreds of microns, owing to the diffusion limitations of oxygen and nutrients [43]. One of the major challenges in tissue engineering for translation in clinical applications is the vascularization of bioengineering scaffolds of clinically relevant size.…”

“…Incorporating biomolecules such as growth factors during scaffold processing with the aim to accelerate local tissue healing however are not simple as biomolecules are sensitive to elevated temperatures and extreme chemical conditions. A promising strategy is the immobilization of proteins and growth factors in the post-processing phase via surface functionalization of the scaffold [43].…”