Vascular grafts are in great demand due to the high occurrence of cardiovascular diseases. Despite the successful replacement of large-diameter blood vessels, small diameter blood vessels (such as coronary arteries) lack suitable replacement materials. Presently, no biomaterial or cell-based tissue-engineered vascular grafts can meet the urgent needs of patients for coronary artery substitutes. Although there has been great progress in developing cell sheet technology for tissue engineered vascular grafts, there is a striking deficit in our understanding of how the human cell donor characteristics influence the engineered material. The objective of this project is to engineer, standardize, and optimize a mechanically strong extracellular matrix tube using a highly aligned nanofibrous scaffold and then combine it with an antithrombogenic cell type to biofabricate a mechanically strong off-the-shelf or personalized small-diameter tissue engineered vascular graft (TEVG).
Preparation of the aligned hMSC-ECM sheet on the hDF-derived ECM. (a, b) hDF culture on the nanopatterned PDMS to obtain highly aligned hDF sheet, (c) decellularization of hDF sheet, and (d, e) hMSC culture on the aligned ECM derived from the hDF sheet
Fabrication of TEVG. (a) Generation of the 3D construct from 2D hMSC-ECM sheets. (b) 3D culture of the tubular hMSC-ECM construct to generate a mature TEVG by using a RWV bioreactor