This hybrid fibrous scaffold mediated hepatocyte attachment with slightly lower efficiency (76 ± 2.3%) than a single-layer galactosylated fibrous scaffold (84 ± 3.5%).
The specific recognition between asialoglycoprotein receptor and galactose ligand at cell substrate interfaces has been shown to mediate hepatocyte adhesion and maintain liver specific functions of hepatocytes.
One of the major challenges in BLAD design is to develop functional substrates suitable for hepatocyte attachment and functional maintenance.
Most importantly, new biophysical insights into the initial hepatocyte attachment that are critical for hepatocyte culture are provided through the decomposition of two-dimensional spreading and adhesion contact formation on bio-functional substrates.
Conventionally, the success of hepatocyte attachment on engineered tissue scaffold is inferred from the degree of two-dimensional cell spreading that is measured by transmitted light microscopy.
Therefore, while coating of substrates with collagen I promotes hepatocyte attachment it may inhibit hepatocyte function.
Tethered EGF had no effect on hepatocyte attachment, contrary to soluble hEGF, which slightly enhanced attachment on 500 μM synKRGD hydrogels compared to unexposed hydrogels, and which yielded a 1.8 fold increase on collagen I-coated TCP.
When compared with gelled collagen, liver biomatrix enhances hepatocyte attachment and survival for longer periods (3 weeks or more) in culture.
In summary, our studies revealed that hepatocyte attachment on collagen-free 400 nm pitch patterned substrates was comparable to that observed for collagen-coated substrates.
Rat hepatocytes attachment efficiency on F68-Gal modified PVDF membrane was similar to that on collagen-coated surface.
