Reduced graphene oxide functionalized nanofibrous silk fibroin matrices for engineering excitable tissues

Abstract

Tissue engineering has provided an alternative strategy for the regeneration of functional tissues for drug screening and disease intervention. The central challenge in the development of mature and functional excitable tissues is to design and construct advanced conductive biomaterials that can guide cells to form electrically interconnected networks. The objective of this study was to develop reduced graphene oxide modified silk nanofibrous biomaterials with controllable surface deposition on the nanoscale. A vacuum filtration system was applied to attain reduced graphene oxide nanolayer deposition. The results demonstrate that with this method, a uniform and compact reduced graphene oxide nanolayer was formed, and the conductivity and nanofibrous morphology of the materials was well controlled. The composite nanofibrous scaffolds were applied for the engineering of cardiac tissues and demonstrated a great ability to promote tissue formation and functions, including the expression of cardiac-specific proteins, the formation of sarcomeric structures and gap junctions, and tissue contraction. External electrical stimulation further enhanced the maturation level of cardiac tissues cultured on these conductive scaffolds. All these results demonstrated the great potential of reduced graphene oxide functionalized silk biomaterials fabricated using our method for recapitulating electrical microenvironments for the regeneration of functional excitable tissues.

Nano‐ and Microfabrication for Engineering Native‐Like Muscle Tissues

“…Copyright 2014, Royal Society of Chemistry. Reproduced with permission under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License . Copyright 2018, the Authors.…”

“…And electromechanical coupling between CMs were observed. Conductive additives, including reduced graphene oxide, gold nanorod, and carbon fibers are added into hydrogels to improve their conductivity and promote the function of engineered tissues. Engineered skeletal muscle tissues may present specific responses upon external electrical stimulations .…”

Combined Application of Graphene‐Family Materials and Silk Fibroin in Biomedicine

“…Statistical analysis of (f) the beating rate and (g) beating intensity of cardiomyocytes cultured on silk and (rGO/silk) 2 scaffolds without and with electrical stimulation. Reproduced from ref . with permission from Nature Publishing Group.…”

“…[96] Zhao et al developed a novel composite scaffold of RGO and SF that had good conductivity and controllable morphology. [97] The composite scaffold showed considerable ability to promote cardiac tissue regeneration, including expression of cardiacspecific proteins, formation of sarcomeric structures and gap junctions, and tissue contraction. And external electrical stimulation could further enhance the maturation level of cardiac tissues cultured on scaffolds ( Figure 6).…”

“…Reproduced from ref. [97] with permission from Nature Publishing Group. Copyright (2018) NPG Asia Materials.…”