Nanofibrous Scaffolds based on Poly(caprolactone)/Chitosan/Poly(vinyl alcohol) Blend for Skin Tissue Engineering

Abstract

Nowadays, blending of natural and synthetic polymers has attracted a considerable interest in tissue engineering for reaching desirable properties. In this study, blend nanofibrous scaffolds were electrospun from poly(caprolactone)/chitosan/poly(vinyl alcohol) blend solutions in 2: 1: 1.5 mass ratio. SEM results showed that uniform and bead-less nanofibers with 136±21nm average diameter were obtained from electrospun poly(caprolactone)/chitosan/poly(vinyl alcohol) blend solutions. Tensile strength test and contact angle measurement demonstrated that addition of PCL led to higher mechanical and physical properties of the resulting web. As a result, addition of PCL in the blend supported the web physical integration in aqueous media of body. Fibroblast cells were cultured on nanofibrous webs to investigate web biocompatibility. The biological results showed appropriate biological properties for the produced nanofibrous webs. Tissue engineered scaffolds were prepared by seeding mesenchymal stem cells on half of the scaffolds. In vivo studies were carried out to investigate the effect of scaffolds on healing of excisional cutting wounds created on the back of the rats. From pathological studies, wounds treated with scaffolds (both acellular and cell-seeded ones) showed better healing compared with control specimens. The results showed that wounds acquired complete healing by the scaffolds within 10-day of post operation, while control wounds achieved healing after 15 days of post surgery operation. It is notable that, cell-seeded-scaffold-treated-wounds showed best healing process due to stem cells ability for collagen regeneration